Steve.V.C.

100 years?

2010-03-09T13:26:00.001-08:00

Two of the oldest people in the world died this week and it made me think of my grandmothers. Fortunately for me, neither one of them made it to 114. I shudder to think what that would be like.

The average life expectancy here in the US is 75. At one point that age seemed to be rising but thanks to obesity-related illnesses I think that might trend back down to a much more manageable 65. We can only hope.

Look, grandparents are great. Generally they spoil you rotten, give you treats you aren’t supposed to have and they serve as a buffer when your parents feel the need to whip you with honing straps or burn you with cheap cigars.

When you’re a little kid they try to tell you what is was like growing up in a concentration camp, but you can usually get them to shut up and read you the latest Encyclopedia Brown installment.

As you get older, they really start to lay in with the guilt but as a teen you’re pretty good at tuning people out so it’s no big deal. It’s just background noise. One thing you don’t tune out is their sorry excuse for not slipping a twenty in your birthday card: “I’m on a fixed income,” they whine.

Yeah, well I’m on a ‘no income’, toots. You know that asshole Reagan you voted for because he “looked like a president?” Well, his voodoo economics put the kibosh on 350 jobs at the Ford plant and now I can’t get a minimum wage job at the Dairy Queen because there are a bunch of 50 year-old men lined up for every shift they can get—but I digress.

Christmas is even worse. My one of my grandmothers would steal toys out of her neighbors’ yards and give them to us. When I was 16 I got a Fisher Price Big Wheel with a broken pedal for Christmas because I was the oldest and it was the biggest present. My brother got a silver ‘frisbee’ that was actually a hub cap from a 1976 Pontiac Bonneville. We were playing with it that Spring and it sliced off one of his fingers on the way to a date with his temporal lobe. To this day he’s psychotic, flying off into weird tantrums where he screams about grievances past and present. About four years ago he came at me with a knife because I poked holes in his ‘Stretch Armstrong’ doll—in 1978! Now he’ll be angry again because I called it a doll.

I held out hope that my grandparents would redeem themselves at my graduation, but they stayed true to the “fixed” income excuse. One grandmother decided bringing a jello mold (with diced veggies suspended inside) to my party was a sufficient gift while the other gave me a hook rug that resembled a diploma. She said it would be something I’d cherish for years to come. Along with the 35 other hook rugs she gifted to me over the years, I suppose.

Then you’re in your 20s and your grandparents are of no use to you at all. They’re bitter. They take every opportunity to make you feel guilty about being young and having an ass that would hold up an adult diaper. You visit with them because you have to, but no matter how much you visit they don’t feel like its enough. This is because in spite of all their speeches about family, love and respect, your parents go out of their way to avoid them. They saddle you with it. “Go visit your grandma,” they say. “She won’t be around forever, after all.”

You can almost hear the hopefulness in their voices when they say that. You hope that it’s soon because when you’re back at home for the Holidays your primary objective is hooking up with all the old high school sluts. Quality time with grandma just cramps your style.

If your grandparents follow the rules, they punch out before you turn 30 and if you’re really lucky all that ‘fixed income’ garbage was just a ruse and you find 30 grand stuffed an old throw pillow that smells like urine, Pall Malls and Ben Gay. If not, maybe you can crash at grandma’s house and cash her Social Security checks for a while. Unless your junky uncle beats you to it. Even so, you’re off the hook. Once the grandparents are gone you just have to put up with your parents and in due time you’ll be able to stick them in a nursing home and charge your own kids with the responsibility of visiting them. It’s the cycle of life.

But not for these triple digit biddies. They just keep hanging around, bleeding Medicare and Social Security dry by living 40 years longer than their benefits were calculated for and demanding your attention. With a little luck, they’ll get dementia and then at least the stories will be interesting. My grandfather once regaled me with a story about how he got into a fist fight with Gerald Ford over the last smoked turkey leg at the Stark County Volunteer Fire Department Banquet. Then he told me to never trust a woman who waxed her beaver and feel asleep. That proved to be the only useful advice he ever gave me. Although he did teach me ‘the shocker…two in the pink, Poppa, two in the pink indeed.

Still, dementia is tricky. Early on it’s amusing but later it gets surreal and disturbing. When your grandmother starts speaking Hindi while she pulls Matchbox cars out of her hooha, it’s just not fun anymore. And that’s what you get when the human odometer rolls over.

Abort, Abort, Abort

2010-01-30T08:00:00.000-08:00

There's a lot being made of Tim Tebow's Super Bowl commercial for Focus on the Family. Apparently Tim's spot is going to feature a pro life message and that has a lot of pro choice advocates upset. They're not as upset by the commercial as they are Focus on the Family's tactics. Focus on the Family often characterizes people who are pro choice as being pro abortion. This is simply true.

I'm pro abortion. I side with the pro choice crowd but it is my belief that most women should get abortions. Let me explain:

If a woman is pregnant there's a pretty good chance she's hot and if she's not hot then she's probably “do-able” under the right circumstances. Even if she's only marginally attractive, the fact that she's pregnant proves that she's promiscuous and promiscuity increases the hotness factor. Guys don't run around impregnating ugly women and women who don't put out aren't likely to get pregnant.

I know, I sound like a pig. That's fine. I accept that. A lot of people can't deal with honesty.

There are cases where I don't approve of abortion. I couldn't care less if married women choose life, unless they're predisposed to cheating on their husbands. I also think that ugly women should not opt for abortions simply because the odds of them getting pregnant again are slim. There's also a distinct possibility that they'll give birth to a girl who will become hot and since this future hottie had an ugly mom she will have low self esteem and be much more likely to turn to sex for validation.

Now I know what you're thinking: Steve, a lot of those pregnant woman might have hot daughters as well. Maybe, but that doesn't do me a whole lot of good. At least not for 15 or 16 years (depending on age of consent restrictions) and even then, I'll be old. That means I'll need more young hot chicks with severe self esteem issues.

No. I need as many promiscuous hot women running around right now. That means abortions. Lots of them. If I were rich I would start up a fund to pay for abortions. My random sex window is closing. I'm rapidly approaching an age where the women I can hook up with don't need abortions because their ovaries have shriveled into bitter old capers.

Unlike some people, I don't find pregnant women particularly attractive. You can keep your “glow” and the increase in breast size stops being a plus once that baby bump emerges. I also don't find women with young children all that attractive and even if I did, they usually aren't very interested in sex. It's natural. This is why male lions and tigers and bears strive to kill cubs in the wild.

I'm hoping that Tim Tebow's spot is so much of a downer that people run out to get abortions just to spite him. I've never really liked Tebow. I don't like anybody who proselytizes and I think that most people get tired of hearing bibles being thumped. I hope Tebow's commercial is sandwiched between a smolderng GoDaddy.com spot and a beer commercial featuring a bunch of models who saved their careers by getting timely abortions. Then, when we go back to the game I hope they open with a shot of the action on South Beach, which will likely be teeming with hot girls, horny guys and the sort of offensive debauchery that makes the stiffs at Focus on the Family write angry sermons.

A Hairy Proposition

2009-07-21T08:18:00.000-07:00

"You'll never catch me, Dudley! Mwuhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhaahahaha!"

I often forget that Mike Coleman is a black man. Normally that would be a good thing. We need to live in a society where color doesn’t matter but in Mike Coleman’s case I don’t think about his ethnicity because of his mustache.

Some people think he looks like Lando Calrissian but I wouldn’t go that far. Lando was cool because he was played by one of the coolest men to ever walk the earth. A lot of guys can’t pull off the mustache without looking like they're trying to overcompensate. Billy Dee did. A lot of black men wear mustaches because Billy Dee Williams rocked it so well. If you’re trying to make the BDW connection with regard to Coleman’s creepy ‘stache you have to concede that he maybe looks like Williams’ gay second cousin from East Lansing. Coleman isn’t cool.

To me, Mike Coleman looks more like a villain from one of those silent movies. Every time I see this guy I wonder which railroad tracks he tied the girl to. Maybe that’s why I don’t ever think of Coleman as a black man…I see him in grainy black and white and when he talks I only her the clacking of an old projector barely drowned out by sinister music being played on a phonograph at the front of the theater. I’ve read that Coleman wants to raise our taxes and I think his mustache is a big reason I don’t want to give it to him.

Another mustache I’m really uncomfortable with is the one Brandon Flowers adorns himself with. The Killers’ front man looks like he’s trying to channel Freddie Mercury when he prances around with his 70s-ish arrangement. It doesn’t work.

I like Brandon fine. I enjoy a lot of The Killers’ music. I think they’ve gone a little too mainstream recently but I don’t begrudge them that. If they want to make some money, more power to them. Far better to sell out early than to do it after your hipster fan base has grown old, fat and encumbered by children. I think it’s pathetic to see some of these “alternative” acts bellying up to the retro trough. Sell out when you matter, load up the bank and then reinvent yourself. That's the way you do it. Do you hear me Smashing Pumpkins?

Still, Flowers is not Freddie Mercury. Nobody is. Freddie’s mustache looked terribly out of place as well but he’s the guy who stole ugly mustaches from porn stars and over-the-road truckers and gave them to gay men. Just because Burt Reynolds and Tom Selleck didn’t have the good sense to give in and let them have it doesn’t mean other straight men should try to steal the look back.

Facial hair is a tricky maneuver that not everybody should be trying. Goatees and mustaches are especially difficult to negotiate because they require regular maintenance that is even more demanding than shaving. They’re easy to misalign. Too often people hold their faces differently when trimming their facial hair, failing to account for the natural position of their heads and the relaxed expression they normally carry. The result is fucked up.

Besides the logistical problems is the fact that too many mustaches and goatees are ironic. A lot of guys try to rock a little facial hair because they want to look manly but they only end up looking queer. There’s no such thing as gaydar but when a guy puts a little too much effort into his facial hair it’s a pretty good indicator that he likes penis other than his own.

The problem is that you can’t not put effort into a mustache or a goatee. If you get lazy you look like a trailer park leasing agent or a dump truck driver. You have to understand the balance between caring about your hair but not looking like you do. That’s where the manliness line is. Most people aren’t macho enough to pull off a mustache or a goatee.

Beards are much easier but you have to customize your beard to your personality. Don’t rock the full biker beard and commute on a Trek. You can’t grow one of those counter-culture Rastafarian beards and hold down a job at a Fortune 500 company. Your beard has to be who you are and it has to work on your face. If you have four chins you might want to forgo the tightly-trimmed jaw line tracer and if your facial hair grows as though you’re in the middle of a round of chemo, it might be best to stick with the baby face.

People are going to judge you by the way you wear your facial hair. There’s nothing wrong with that. Facial hair is a personal choice. If you choose to look like a gay man heading for a cabaret, don’t be surprised when some bear slips you a roofie and you wake up aching on both ends and if you want to raise my taxes, try shaving off that pencil-thin huckster ‘stache.

The truth about Mom and Dad

2009-07-10T10:08:00.000-07:00

People often ask me, SteveVC, why do you hate your parents so much? The answer is that I don’t hate them at all. I absolutely adore them. Now that they’re in prison and can no longer torture and kill innocent pets and wayward hobos I’ve really come to respect and admire them.

My mom, whose real name is Eunice Blatz, has lived a hard life. She was cut out of the Blatz family fortune when her father married Tonya Harding and left the balance of the estate to her. It’s not as glamorous as it sounds. Tonya inherited a 1975 Ford LTD with one headlight and a doublewide trailer in Muskegon Michigan, several rows up from the lake. Still, it was hard on my mom.

She worked in the fetish porn industry for a while before taking to the road with several other women who could queef on demand. They were called the Pussy-fart Dolls and they were big hits, touring the truckstop circuit of the southwest through the late 50s and early 60s, before they set up shop in a seedy little Hollywood Blvd dive that was later purchased by Johnny Depp and renamed The Viper Room. Rumor has it that the burlesque troupe that performed there took their name from an old poster that was in the dressing room. But they changed “fart” to “cat” since none of them were particularly good at queefing, although that changed when Nicole Scherzinger became the front woman.

Pregnant with me, my mom kept performing. My grandmother, who was a bouncer at the club, told me that I was technically miscarried four times, generally being ejected from my mother's uterus during the her show stopping rendition of Foxy Lady. They’d just stuff the fetal version of me back inside and mom would go back to work. I was none the worse for wear, but the doctor was a little disturbed to find cigarette butts, pull tabs and M&Ms in stuck to the placenta.

Growing up, my mom was truly attentive. She slept with one eye open all the time. It was a glass eye. She lost her real eye in a knife fight with a Mexican trucker who accused her of stealing his wallet with her vagina during a show. She always said “Big Eunice 2, wetback trucker1…hahahaha” when she talked about it. I never knew what she meant by that as a kid but I found out not too long ago that those ugly earrings with the lumpy gray pearls were actually his testicles.

Mom ruled the house with a firm hand and a lit cigarette. When I got out of line she’d burn me with that cigarette cackling, “You’ve come a long way baby!” I once made the mistake of correcting her for using the Virginia Slims tagline when her cigarette of choice was a Newport, which she developed a taste for in grade school when she dated a pimp from Detroit named Sugar Finger. Mom made me eat an ashtray full of cigarette butts, soaked me with lighter fluid and flung lit “strike anywhere” matches at me. After she depleted the whole box, the matches snuffing out before they hit me, she sent me up the road for a box of Garcia y Vega cigars and for the next six weeks I was punished with cheap stogies instead of the milder menthol cigarettes. There are still scars on my body that smell like burnt tobacco. Whenever I have to make a moral decision, I sniff one and think of my mom.

My dad was a cross between Al Bundy and Joe Jackson. He was an alternate on the 1960 curling team and desperately wanted his kids to achieve success where he had failed. Every morning we’d wake up at 3:00am and head outside to practice. 365 days a year. I say we because for a while I had a brother but one day he had the flu and couldn’t get out of bed. My dad canceled practice that day, drove us to Vermont and sold him to a maple syrup plantation. For all I know my little brother is still out there gathering buckets full of sap with a vicious Doberman tracking him, waiting for him to deviate from his route. I think of him whenever I have pancakes.

I had other siblings but they were lost along the way. During the winter my parents saved money by playing a game called Donner Party. When they first mentioned it I was excited because all I heard was the word “party”. I quickly learned what the Donner aspect was.

They never turned the heat on and during the day we’d get thrown outside in the snow. We did our best to keep warm but eventually your body just starts to shut down. Mom and dad would watch intently from the window, waiting. Waiting for one of us to succumb to the frigid air. When somebody finally fell to the ground, the victim of hypothermia, the game was over and we all went inside for dinner. A big dinner with all the trimmings and lots of fresh meat. I didn’t want to eat my baby sister, I swear I didn’t, but I was so very hungry and she was delicious.

Seven kids went into that family. One was sent to Vermont, I made it out alive. We ate the rest.

Anyway, Curling. Dad wanted me to be the best curler ever. Every day sliding rocks and sweeping. During the summer we did it in the back yard. Have you ever tried to curl on grass? It’s impossible, but after hundreds of vicious beatings I found a way to make it work. I was great.

The problem is that I had too much power on ice. By the time winter rolled around I was all yoked up for curling on grass and my control was off. I was blasting rocks through arena walls on the amateur circuit. I was sweeping the ice right down to the concrete floor. At the Outdoor Games in Saranac Lake one year, five people drowned when my aggressive sweeping cracked through the ice. It was a disaster. You might have seen it on George Michael's Sports Machine.

The International Curling Association reviewed my performances and insisted I was on steroids. I passed every test but they eventually banned me from competition because I was a danger to other competitors. I was told I could apply for reinstatement after 5 years but didn’t fit into my dad’s plans. He was crushed. I was supposed to bring home the gold. A five year suspension was out of the question.

I was kicked out of the family and forced to make it on my own. I dabbled in hook rugs, migrant working and gay porn before I made my bones in the fast food industry. After a few years out of the game, my curling form is manageable and I hustle fools on the weekends. I still have wicked power which comes in handy when people set up blocking stones. BOOM. Cleared the ice again. I’ve been thinking about going pro if I can get a work visa in Canada. People know me in curling circles. I’m a little old, but I’ve got mad skills.

My parents were arrested for plotting to assassinate Danny DeVito (It’s a long story, don’t ask.) and I reconnected with them at the trial. We vented our frustrations with each other. I bought my mom a few cartons of Newports to make up for all the cigarettes she crushed out on me and my dad is pretty happy that I’m a street curler. They probably won’t get out of prison alive. My dad will out last my mom by becoming somebody’s bitch (after all, that’s how he survived the marriage) but he’s not healthy. He used to freebase bacon and his heart is weak. Mom will get shanked within a year. She’s just not as quick as she used to be. Surly as she ever was, but the reflexes are shot.

Anyway that’s the story, I hope it explains where I’m coming from.

closure

2009-06-11T08:08:00.001-07:00

As a Gen-Xer I have come to hate the term “closure”. I understand the importance of resolving things but to me the 90s was the “closure” decade. It’s like everybody my age wanted a cookie. I don’t know why. I blame post-goth, grunge wannabes like Ethan Hawke and Winona Ryder. So much vying for validation while acting like they were too cool to care. A bunch of whimpering pansies we were.

I suppose that’s what happens when your grandparents start browbeating you with tales of how great they were. Surviving the Great Depression, fighting back the scourge of NAZI Germany, and then getting called right back into the Cold War. They were the ultimate patriots and they never let you forget it. Then Tom Brokaw had to come along and jerk them off with his tome, The Greatest Generation. Thanks a lot Tom, I can’t speak for everybody else but my Grandparents wore that shit like a badge. Read this book, boy. Read it and understand. Understand that you owe us. You owe us everything. Now run to the store and get me a big box of Depends.

At least they died before they sucked every bit of the zest for life out of me. They did a hell of a job convincing me that the world was going to end in THE YEAR 2000, which is why I never really felt the need to excel in my studies or worry about holding down a good job, but they kicked the bucket before I blew my brains out like Cobain. That’s why he did it, you know. He was a GOD but when he told his grandmother she laughed in his face and told him he’d never be as good as Mel Torme. His parents were no better. Our generation wrote the book on Rock music, Curt. We don’t know why you’re wasting your time.

Our parents didn’t help matters much. They managed to turn dodging the draft and smoking dope into some sort of revolution. Basically they partied for 10 years but to hear them tell it, they were in the trenches making the world a better place for our undeserving asses. We weren’t worthy and we never would be. Our Grandparents agreed.

So Gen-X grew up feeling like crap and half-believing that we were all going to die in some horrific apocalyptic disaster in THE YEAR 2000. We were worthless and we’d never amount to anything.

As we got older we pierced our faces, shoplifted stuff on Rodeo Drive and started our quest for something called “closure”. By the late 90s it was a fucking buzz word. If Starbucks didn’t give you skim milk you called their customer service line for “closure”. We fought with our parents at our grandparents funerals in hopes of reaching “closure”. If your roomie borrowed your socks you were forced to pout until he gave you “closure”.

Now it’s 2009 and most of Generation X is staring down the barrel of the big FOUR OH. Some of us are already there. We’ve resigned ourselves to the fact that life is going to keep rolling whether we get “closure” or not, so most of us just plug along.

We don’t try to make the younger generations feel bad even though it’s painfully obvious they’re a bunch of spoiled little punks who don’t know what it was like to live in an era before you could watch HULU or listen to MP3s on your phone. Back in our day, you had to listen to music on a portable CD player that would skip every time you moved. One second you’re jamming to If I could turn back time and the next Will Smith was Gettin Jiggy Widit. Phones where as big as shoe boxes, weighed as much as a cinder block and they gave you cancer instantly. All you got in return was a shitty phone call that got dropped before you could get any “closure.”

What Would Jesus Do?

2009-06-03T14:07:00.000-07:00

Friday is Refrigerator Day in my office. That’s when one or two of the members of a designated group have to go in and purge the refrigerator. Exceptions are made for condiments, coffee creamer and obviously sealed items such as soft drinks (in these parts we call it pop, but I don’t want to piss of you soda snobs who might stumble upon this), but around 4:00 on Friday afternoon anything else is bound for the trash.

We all know this. It is the law. So it is written, so it shall be done. Because I’m so much cooler than everybody else, I don’t even use the fridge. I pretend I do, so I can steal leftover pizza and the occasional can of Red Bull, but when Friday comes around you could blow the damned refrigerator up and I wouldn’t give rat’s ass. (Where does that expression come from? I use it, but it still bothers me. Did people actually use rat’s asses in trades back in the day?)

Of course that doesn’t stop the rest of the people in my office from making a major production out of the affair. Usually there’s an announcement over the intercom. That’s fine, but recently the announcement was way too fucking long. We’re several months into the whole cleaning thing and people know that Friday is Fridge Day. A simple “We’re emptying the Refigerator in 5 minutes” would suffice but was that good enough for *****? No. ***** had so much to say it took her two overhead pages to get it out. Our intercom has a time limit and lengthy pages get cut off.

I was a little irritated. Part of it is because I don’t like *****. She’s one of those born again Christian-types who assumes that all white people like NASCAR, Jesus, country music and the KKK. Whenever she starts talking I get the urge to buy some underwear from WalMart and see if my sister’s available for a little phone sex. It’s really that bad.

I was also pretty busy and the pages distracted me. *BEEP* BlardyblahblardyblahRefrigeratorblahbladryblah…. *BEEP* Blah blardyblardyblahblardyclean-outblardyblahblahblah.
Then came the other pages. *BEEP* There’s a nice bowl in here and I’d hate to throw it away it’s… *BEEP* …it’s blue with a white floral pattern.

*BEEP* Ummm, they’re going to throw away a frech container of potato salad. You might want to get it.

*BEEP* There’s a nice cup in the sink, it’s blue with a white floral pattern.

*BEEP* Did somebody buy groceries earlier? There’s a bag of fresh food on the… *BEEP* …second shelf.
I was in my office going insane. Nobody else is in my office. I normally sit in the server room and do what tech guys do (troll the Casual Encounters section on Craigslist), but today I was busy and the incessant pages pissed me off. “God fucking dammit,” I said to myself. “Just throw the shit away and shut the fuck up.”

I’m not the most professional guy in the world but I’m not exactly the office potty mouth. I generally avoid swearing, cussing or cursing simply because I like to be more ornate when I speak. I also don’t like to draw too much attention to myself at work. I do what I need to do to get by and pretend that I’m much busier than I really am. It’s the secret to my success.

Sadly, one of the office Jesus Freaks overheard my private tantrum and she had to poke her head in to let me know that she didn’t like it. “You took the LORD’s name in vain,” she advised.

“No I didn’t,” I replied. “I said god-fucking-dammit. I never called him by name. I might have meant some other god.”

“There’s only one,” she said.

I laughed, “Then you tell that to Odin and Thor because I’m not going to mess with them.”

She didn’t like that at all. I think she thought that I was mocking her religion. That’s not that case. I was mocking her. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have much respect for her religion or any religion for that matter, but I don’t go out of my way to offend religious people. At least not any further out of my way than I do to offend everybody else. Like Hungarians, for example. Shut up, Laszlo.

The last time I checked I wear big boy pants. So does everybody in my office. People sometimes act like babies, but we are all adults and, I believe, that as adults we have a responsibility to accept certain things. I accept the fact that most people are stupid, perhaps you can accept the occasion f-bomb. It’s not like Seth Rogen is writing my dialogue.

You’re not going to burn in hell because you overheard me swearing, or cursing or blaspheming or whatever the fuck you want to call it. If your god has a beef with me he can take it up with me but I’ve read at least one version of the bible and got the general impression that Christianity is supposed to be a “mind your own business” enterprise. Jesus probably doesn’t care if I say “fuck” every once in a while and probably doesn’t want you to poke your head in my office to register your disdain. I know I don’t.

I told another coworker, who heard that I had been a bad boy, that I don’t go out of my way to offend people and that I’d expect others to reciprocate by not going out of their way to be offended. We have people at work who keep their ears perked up so they can catch an errant profanity and take umbrage. Then they go to a manager and spend 15 minutes throwing themselves a pity party.

What’s funny is that these so-called Christians are much more offensive than a few choice expletives. I’ve walked into the break room to hear conversations about Barack Obama being the Anti-Christ, disparaging remarks about Muslims, and horrible comments about gays. One of my other coworkers is openly gay! I wonder how it would go over if I had a conversation with somebody about the joys of atheism. I bet that would stir up a lively discussion.

I just don’t understand that brand of religion. You’re going to pitch a holy fit over “god-fucking-dammit” but yet you see nothing wrong with sitting in the office break room and carrying on a conversation about gays burning in hell. It doesn’t add up. I suppose you can interpret that one of the commandments addresses cursing, but I know that homosexuality isn’t on that list and besides that, the 10 commandments are rules for you to follow, not enforce. Religiots.

Hey, Joe

2009-05-08T08:43:00.000-07:00

Duh

I probably shouldn’t waste my time on Joe Wuzzlebucker, or Joe The (unlicensed) Plumber, but he hails from Ohio and as a native I feel the need to offer some sort of counterpoint. It’s my duty to make sure that, while most of the state is full of idiots just like Weasleblubber, there are actually a handful of thoughtful people who live here. We don’t necessarily like it, but we do the best we can.

Whipplebeater rose to fame when he confronted Barack Obama on his economic policies. He lamented that fact that Obama’s tax plan would discourage him from buying the company he worked for even though that company was so small that it was eligible for tax cuts under Obama’s plan. It was later revealed that Whatsabooger had never discussed any purchase arrangement with the owner of the company and of course we learned that Joe wasn’t really a plumber at all, but rather an unlicensed tech known for unclogging toilets with his bare hands. Sometimes, according to a number of his customers, he even ate poop. Disgusting.

Wumpleborshter became an instant celebrity and at first pretended not to like it. He was a regular guy who never asked for the attention. A regular guy who didn’t pay his taxes, worked illegally as an unlicensed professional, had pre-existing ties to John McCain, and who hired a publicity firm so he could distance himself as far from being a regular guy as possible. A regular guy who enjoys kimchee enemas, gay anime porn, purple nurples, and weekly spankings from Jamie Farr.

Whackyburger actually doing quite well as a media whore. He’s pretended to be a journalist and an author. He’s a keen political analyst offering such brilliant insights as “a vote for Obama is a vote for the death of Israel” and “one step closer to socialism” even though he has no idea what socialism is (the only Marx he knows is Groucho) and he couldn’t point to Israel on a map.

Recently, Whosabubba gave us his insight of homosexuality. It would appear that Joe The Relentless Hack is now an expert on social issues. He thinks that homosexuals are queer and to justify this stance he looked it up in the dictionary. Queer, he says, means strange or unusual different and homosexuals are strange. “It’s not like a slur,” he told Christian Today (formerly Voice of the KKK) magazine, “like you would call a white person a honky or something like that." Then he explains that God is clear about what men and women are for. So apparently it’s also Joe The Evangelical Minister now as well. Stupid ass honky.

The problem, of course, is that regardless of what version of God you believe in, there is no clarity on the subject of homosexuality. The bible has passages that seem to condemn it but then there are other passages that seem to accept it. The confusion exists because it’s not spelled out in simple terms. Christians seem pretty sure that homosexuality is a sin but God didn’t seem to think it was worth wasting a commandment on and Jesus didn’t make it his mission to put an end to guy on guy action.

Regardless of what conservatives try to tell you, homosexuality just wasn’t a priority. Unless the whole “thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s ass” line was supposed to be interpreted as a prohibition on guy–on-guy action. Unless it’s with a Congressional page, your meth dealer or a stranger in the men’s room. The reason it’s such a big deal now is because all those bible-thumping Christians are terrified that one day one of their children might come home for college with a close friend of the same gender and tell them that they’re gay and opening a community theater in Portland together. Oh the horror!

But Weinerbelcher, like most so-called Christians, hasn’t read the bible. It’s quite possible that he doesn’t know how to read at all because if he could read, he probably wouldn’t have missed the city regulation that mandated the need for a plumbing license. Of course, the guy’s not all bad. He was quick to mention that he has gay friends and that they all understand where he stands. Apparently they take no offense that Joe The Homophobe doesn’t want them around his kids.

Of course that’s probably not an issue he needs to address. Gays tend to have an aversion to inbred twits and their rotten children. It’s unlikely that Joe The Blithering Idiot knows any openly gay people and if he does it’s doubtful that they consider him a friend, but if he’s worried about his kids he should rethink his association with the Republican Party and all those back room boy toys in its midst.

The guy is an assclown but because the people who run conservative media outlets are elitist snobs who think that working class people are just as moronic as Weeblebater, they keep giving him a forum to speak his mind and that’s too bad.

Look, I’m not delusional. I know a lot of working class people right here in Ohio and they aren’t exactly geniuses. Ohio is probably home to more than its fair share of stupid people, but that doesn’t mean we should take the biggest unwashed rube from the huddled masses and make a star out of him. There are real plumbers with real opinions and better means of expressing them. Why not give them 15 minutes of fame?

The O'Reilly Factor

2009-03-30T13:28:00.000-07:00

Bill O’Reilly is boycotting Sean Penn. O’Reilly acknowledges that Sean Penn is a great actor but apparently this has everything to do with Penn’s political leanings and not because O’Reilly felt “it” move during some of the romantic scenes in Penn’s recent film, Milk.

Nope. O’Reilly is exercising his “right as an American” because Sean Penn doesn’t jibe with O’Reilly’s neo-conservative point of view. According to Reilly, Penn “…gives aid and comfort to people like Ahmadinejad, Hugo Chavez and Saddam Hussein…”

Apparently O’Reilly’s been paying more attention to Sean Penn’s political affiliations than I do. I’ve always thought of Sean Penn as a brilliant actor with a quick temper and a rather reclusive personality. Even though I consider myself to be a liberal, I don’t necessarily view Sean Penn as somebody I would want to take sociology lesions from. I admire his work, but I really couldn’t care less what his politics are. I also liked Ron Silver even though I found his conversion to rabid conservatism to be a little disturbing. But Silver really took the 9-11 attacks to heart and wanted to set the world on fire so everybody else could feel his pain.

Actors aren’t always very smart. Some are brilliant people with tremendous talent that spans several genres. Like Bruce Willis who combines the ability to portray deep characters as varied as a hard-nosed New York cop who thwarts an international terrorist group to playing a rough-around-the-edges Pittsburgh cop who ultimately captures a familial serial killer…but Willis is also a recording artist. So is John Goodman, Billy Bob Thornton and Lindsay Lohan. But not everybody swims in pools of talent so deep. For every Hilary Duff there’s a one dimensional clod like Phillip Seymour Hoffman who just “acts”.

Sean Penn is just an actor and clearly not as multitalented as most of his peers. He’s been in a couple of decent movies and actually turns in a good performance more often than not, but he is still just an actor. He lacks depth and versatility, clearly a byproduct of his beatnik upbringing which was only exacerbated by a lack of formal education. A person would be crazy to listen to him.

Bill O’Reilly, on the other hand, went to college. He earned a degree in History from Marist, got himself a Masters in Broadcast Journalism from Boston University and later went to Harvard to get another Masters degree, this one in Public Administration. Granted, none of those degrees is particularly valuable. An MA in Public Administration is a step above making your own degree out of construction paper and Broadcast Journalism is what you get a degree in if your text books are yellow and entitled "The Idiot's Guide to..." I'm not saying these aren't real degrees, but real and possessing substance are two totally different things. They are the sort of courses one takes when they simply have a lot of time and money on their hands. They are also the sort of courses people took during the Vietnam era when they didn't have the balls to dodge the draft like real hippies. Big Bad Bill, by the way, graduated from high school in 1967. Convenient, no?

Now there are those who might say that a man motivated to collect all those sheepskins must be overcompensating for something, but that would only be the case if that man was so enthralled with himself that he would edit his own Wikipedia page to make sure that all of those degrees were mentioned, especially if that page included references to specific teachers and overseas studies. Hey everybody come see how smart I look. That would be sick.

Bill O’Reilly learned a lot in college too. Unlike Sean Penn, who is a notorious hot head, O’Reilly is a skilled debater who never loses his cool. Penn’s been in and out of trouble his whole life, but O’Reilly has never been taken to task for his lack of decorum. Which one do you trust?

Sean Penn: “Sacrificing American soldiers or innocent civilians in an unprecedented preemptive attack on a separate sovereign nation may well prove itself a most temporary medicine.”

Bill O’Reilly: “If I'm the president of the United States, I walk right into Union Square, I set up my little presidential podium, and I say, 'Listen, citizens of San Francisco, if you vote against military recruiting, you're not going to get another nickel in federal funds. Fine. You want to be your own country? Go right ahead. And if Al Qaeda comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it. We're going to say, look, every other place in America is off limits to you, except San Francisco. You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead.”

Sean Penn’s pretty stupid isn’t he? Especially when you compare him quote for quote with Bill O’Reilly. See what a difference an education makes? Sean Penn’s clearly better off if he sticks to acting where other people—educated people—write his words for him. He’s just not equipped to deliver his own thoughts off the cuff and, based on his temperamental history, it’s probably best not to engage him in any sort of debate. He’s likely to scream at you to shut up or even go so far as to have a producer cut your mic off. That’s the kind of childish behavior you’d expect from a pampered Hollywood fat cat. Bill O'Reilly would never resort to such childish tactics.

You’d think somebody as brilliant and better than everybody as Bill O’Reilly wouldn’t see the need to waste his time boycotting the likes of Sean Penn, but that’s just the kind of guy Bill O’Reilly is. He’s not doing it for himself, he’s doing it for America. Sean Penn is evil. He loves communists and hates America. Somebody has to call him on it, and Bill O’Reilly is just the man for the job. He's a real American hero.

Rather than close by writing something poignant I’m going to offer up one more pearl from Bill. Remember, America, he’s the only guy with the guts to stand between Sean Penn’s leftist agenda and our wholesome values.

"So anyway I'd be rubbing your big boobs and getting your nipples really hard, kinda' kissing your neck from behind...and then I would take the other hand with the falafel thing and I'd just put it on your pussy but you'd have to do it really light, just kind of a tease business..."

Way to go, Bill!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

2009-02-27T08:24:00.001-08:00

HAHAHAHAHAHA

---sorry--hahahahahaha

Seriously, I'm sorry. I just read a story about Columbus mayor Mike Coleman's State of the City address. Obviously I didn't watch it last night. Apparently the City of Columbus, like most cities, is facing some serious budget shortfalls. In addition to the variety of fees and fines Columbus imposes to generate revenue, the city also charges a flat 2% income tax to both residents and people who work here.

During the 80s, when the rest of Ohio was getting its ass kicked by Reaganomics, Columbus grew. It's economy is not tied to manufacturing as is the case with so many other Midwestern cities. Columbus is a service-based town. In fact, the few factories that are in Columbus struggle with the local labor force. People in Columbus aren't used to concepts like being on time or having a strict schedule for breaks and lunches. So Columbus has always enjoyed a higher quality of life than you'd find in the rest of the region. That means the income tax revenue was pretty nifty.

So Columbus knows how to spend money. The city has dumped big money into projects that are far more ornate than they need to be. The Short North arts district features arches over High Street that look fabulous but set the city back a small fortune. Especially since the city allowed the first contractor to install a defective lighting system and fixed the problem by hiring a second contractor.

The city also spent a ton of money building a pedestrian bridge over the Olentangy River which connects a popular bike/jogging trail to the neighborhoods on the other side of the river. I like the bridge but I think it's probably a tad pricier than we really needed. Of course when the contract was awarded Columbus was rolling in money.

Now that the money's gone, Coleman wants to increase the city's income tax but to do it he has to put the issue on the ballot. That means the citizens of Columbus have to volunteer to be bilked.

That's funny. Mike Coleman's a popular mayor and as mayors go I think he's done a decent job. He's a little more of a political glad-hander than I would like. During election years he spends far too much time traveling the campaign trail while he draws the fat city salary. As a citizen I would rather have him step down to campaign or simply stay focused on the job to which we elected him, but that's PAU. Politics As Usual. Coleman wants to be governor someday so he's got to play the game. That's OK.

What's not OK is expecting a city that has been hit hard by this recession to fork over more money. It's not my fault that city leaders failed to see the writing on the wall 2 or three years ago. If Mike Coleman had been spending more time doing his job and less time pressing political flesh he might have made proactive cuts and bolstered the city's financial reserves. Instead he spent money like it was growing on trees. Columbus squandered its financial resources on vanity projects. Now it's paying the price.

The thing that pisses me off is that Coleman managed to schmooze a few million bucks out of Obama and they dumped that money back into a bloated police force that desperately needs to be streamlined. It's true that more cops could be used on the street but I think we could find the resources to accomplish that by getting rid of a significant number of the administrative types.

For Mike Coleman I have only two words to offer in response to his tax hike proposal: FUCK YOU! I've lived in Columbus for nearly 20 years now and I've yet to see my tax dollars benefit me...not in that selfish republican way but in a reasonablem indirect manner. Based on census figures the median income for your average Columbus resident is just under 40 grand a year and they all pay a flat 2%. Where's it going? I don't necessarily have a problem with some of the projects the city has invested in, but a lot of money has been wasted in the process. In addition to doubling the cost of a number of projects by hiring shady contractors, Columbus has squandered millions on studies that never go anywhere.

The worst thing that could happen is the city government would go broke. So what? It's not like some bank is going to come in and repossess everything within the city limits sending 3/4 of a million people out into the great wide open. Some people will tell you that the city would be without a police and fire department but somehow I think public safety would be accounted for. What would not be accounted for are the city officials who get paid six figure salaries to debate the merits of a street car system that would span a 2 mile stretch between the edge of downtown Columbus and the Ohio State University entertainment district. I could have drafted a proposal for free. I like to call it WALK, FATTY. Seriously, it's two miles! We already have buses that run that section of High Street and nobody uses them. Now you want to fund street cars? Who pays these people?

I don't know how long this recession is going to last. I don't know if I'll still have a job when it's all said and done. These are harrowing times. We're all facing risks and we're all going to have to get used to some financial shortfalls. It's not fair for the government to leave a notch on its belt opened by asking the rest of us to poke another hole in our own. Mike Coleman can kiss my ass. I'm voting no on a tax hike.

Sex/ Drugs/Rock-n-Roll

2009-01-29T13:54:00.000-08:00

Common Sense Media has issued a report claiming that one out of six ads featured during football broadcasts are inappropriate for children. The report breaks down the number of ads that feature violent content (probably promos for 24 run incessantly by Fox during football broadcasts), alcohol, sexual content and the uncomfortable subject of erectile dysfunction.

I guess they have a point but the one thing I don't get is who determines what is appropriate for children? CSM claims that they don't endorse censorship but at the same time they seem eager to put the onus on networks and, at least in the case, the NFL.

Look, I don't like those 24 promos either. It's not the violence, it's the Kiefer. It's great that Donald Sutherland's kid is back in the acting saddle but there's a reason he fell off of the A-list and you can see that reason in his movie Mirrors. I'm an 80s guy and I'm comfortable with admitting that I enjoyed much of what 80s pop culture had to offer. I don't hate Kiefer Sutherland because I got drunk one night and had "Doc" tattooed on my left bicep. Young Guns wasn't a great movie but it was good fun and a lot of guys called their social pack The Regulators. It's a little embarrassing but it wasn't his fault.

It might not even be his fault that he's not all that great an actor that doesn't mean we should create an entire franchise around his over-the-top interpretation of a super secret agent saddled with the burden of saving the world. We don't see D.B. Sweeney out there whoring himself, do we?

But are the 24 promos too violent? I don't think so. Kids enjoy destruction and tend to play violence out in their fantasies because it gives them a sense of power. That's why I got a hell of a lot more satisfaction stomping sand castles into oblivion than I did from building them.

I also grew up around alcohol. I can still recall beer jingles with greater consistency than I can nursery rhymes...From one beer lover to another Stroh's beer... but I'm not an alcoholic. I dabbled in underage drinking but that had nothing to do with commercials. It was a test of machismo. I was cool because I could buy beer when I was 16 and now I maintain my coolness by buying beer for 16 year-olds who aren't as...endowed as I was. Also, I get a lot of action that way. That's the thing about high school girls, I keep getting older and they stay the same age.

Now I am all for banning those damned Viagra/Cialis/Levitra commercials...especially the Levitra commercials that featured Mike Ditka. That should be in the Viagra disclaimers: If you experience an erection lasting longer than four hours just picture Mike Ditka with an erection lasting longer than fours hours. Mike Ditka gave me ED. He is just one of those people you don't want to associate with sex. I hope he doesn't have kids because then I would have an accurate count of how many times he's had sex in his life. Ick.

I don't want to see commercials about old guys who can't get it up. That never seemed to be a problem back in the old days. You know what men had before Viagra? Sexual Harassment. That's right, back in the day when you couldn't build up enough steam for your wife you hired a cute little secretary and you had her take dictation... from behind. And your wife? She screwed the milk man after you left for work. Everybody was happy. Now we don't even have milk men because bored housewives stopped screwing their brains out. Why the hell do you think they delivered something you could easily pick up at the store in the first place? It was always about the sex.

What about the kids back then? Common Sense Media wasn't running around worried about kids coming home from school to see their mothers getting plowed by the Maytag repair man, so what's the problem with a little T&A during a football broadcast? Grow up. Boys have a penis, girls have a vagina and they feel good when you stick them together. Big deal.

The thing of it is, Common Sense Media is pitching a bitch on a topic that is entirely subjective. For every parent who dreads having to explain what erectile dysfunction is, there's another who has already done it and the kids who are properly informed are the ones who can disseminate all of the content that Common Sense Media denounces. How hard is it to tell a six year old, not to shoot people for real and that old guys can't get boners. Man that's tough. Pour yourself a cold one.

I appreciate the CSM isn't organizing book burnings or marching on Washington to demand censorship, but they make the mistake of blaming the wrong people. We live in a multimedia society. Kids have access to a lot of information and some of requires a little parental guidance. Rather than taking the NFL to task, CSM should turn the tables on its members and challenge them to do a better job of educating their children.

Convert this!

2009-01-22T13:38:00.000-08:00

You know, TV is not a necessity. I mean, it’s hard to imagine a time when there wasn’t a TV in every room of every home but I can vaguely recollect a period in my life where there was only one television in the entire house and generally it was commandeered by my father who somehow managed to watch it in his sleep. Moreover, this was broadcast television and we only had access to four channels, three of which required extensive technical skills to properly tune. Unless you were my father, in which case he could punch or kick the TV until it did what he wanted.

I’ve heard stories of an era when there was no television and there weren’t even dinosaurs running around. Seriously. There are people alive today who lived without the comforting and informative din of television. Could you imagine that? No Tony Little infomercials at 3 am.

Ironically the people who lived without television for so long are the same people who are lamenting this new-fangled conversion to digital broadcasting. These people managed to suck the life out of the Federal program that provided coupons to help people purchase digital converter boxes for their televisions. Sadly, the majority of the people who acquired these boxes didn’t stop to consider the fact that they didn’t need them because they either had newer television sets that were digitally compatible or they were hooked up to digital cable already.

That’s the thing about old people; they love to get stuff on the cheap. Even if they don’t need it they will buy it if they think they are getting a good price. If Barack Obama wants to stimulate the economy he needs to figure out how to get old people onto Craigslist. As long as we find a way to keep them out of the Casual Encounters listings…that stuff is creepy enough as it is without catching a glimpse of granny's hooha.

It’s no surprise that the government ran out of money to fund the converter box program because the government used PSAs directed at old people to promote the program. You’ve probably seen them. One has an old biddy sitting by a pool with an ancient CRT floating on the water. She prattles on and on in a whiny old biddy voice about the digital conversion and how to get a coupon. The geezers watching probably don’t hear anything other than “free” and “coupon” but that’s all it takes. That and a toll free number. And of course it’s an 800 number because old people still don’t trust those fancy 888, or 866 numbers. I hate that old lady.

Of course they have an equally annoying PSA featuring a grouchy old coot standing in the middle of the desert. Now I suppose that there’s some sort of visual metaphor behind these commercials but I have to use too much brain power to connect the dots, so I’m pretty sure that old people aren’t getting it. If anything I imagine they’re getting worked up over the wrong things. “Get out of the desert! You’ll get dehydrated!” or “You can’t put a TV in a pool!”

I get pissed off because I know that the government forked over too much money to pay for those ads. As annoying as they are, there is some production value involved and that’s going to confuse the target audience. PSAs from the government are supposed to be severe and very blunt. Uncle SAM wants you to get a digital converter box. Then you make them go to an office in the nearest big city to pick it up. Old people are used to being inconvenienced. They like it. It makes them feel like they're doing their duty.

Two PSAs is excessive but I suppose that there are a bunch of old men out there who won’t take technical advice from a split tail and they needed to have a PSA featuring a woman so the retired old haus fraus would understand that they were allowed to fix their own TVs. It’s all so complicated and the worst part is that old people only tune to one channel and they never really watch it; they just nod off in front of the TV. That's a lot of effort so Aunt Esther can take her post-poop snooze.

And it doesn’t have to be that way. TV is not a necessity. It’s also not a right. When TV was first marketed the government didn’t implement a program to help people purchase them. You had to scrimp and save to buy your own and for that one brief moment in history the joke was on the rich bastards who could buy the TVs since there was only one show for the first 20 or 30 years of television. All Uncle Milty all the time. Boy, did I miss out.

So why are we all of the sudden worried about a handful of people who are still watching TV on the old black and white Zenith they bought in 1956? So what if their sets go dark later next month? Is it fair to hold back progress for everybody because a couple of people are going to be inconvenienced? Buy a new TV, gramps!

I know; a lot of these people are too poor or just not able to run out and buy a new set. So what? I don’t mean to sound heartless but people are denied food and medical attention all the time. Why the hell are we worried about TV?

An asshole by any other name

2008-12-17T05:55:00.000-08:00

Perhaps you've read the story of a New Jersey man's struggle to acquire a birthday cake for his child earlier this month. Heath Campbell thinks it's time for people to stop living in the past but isn't that what he's doing by naming his son Adolf Hitler Campbell?

Heath points to the election of Barrack Obama as the bellwether for change and feels that all of the ill will associated with NAZI Germany needs to pass. Heath, meanwhile enjoys wearing vintage boots that once belonged to a member of the infamous SS. One of Campbell's other children, by the way, is named JoyceLynn Aryan Nation Campbell but Heath insists that he isn't a racist. He points out that there were children of mixed races at his son's birthday party and claims that even though he was raised to avoid interacting with people of other races, he's comfortable with his children hanging out with black kids.

It's interesting that the reporter who conducted this interview didn't ask how Campbell felt about Jews, seeing as how that was Hitler's particular passion, but I suppose I'd miss a point or two if I was asked to give this whack job his 15 minutes of fame. This just isn't the sort of story you imagine writing when you're in journalism school.

It's obvious that Heath and his wife, Eva Braun, are using their children to draw attention to themselves. In the past Heath and his wife have harassed the local grocer with requests for cakes adorned with similarly offensive expressions such as swastikas. The local store refuses these requests so the Campbells have to turn to Wal-Mart to fulfill the special order. You've got to love Wal-Mart.

Now the Campbells are upset that they are the focus of a lot of ire. They claim that they've been harassed by angry postings on the internet in response to a local article on their plight. At least they claim to be upset. If you ask me, they're getting exactly what they wanted.

I think most people realize that freedom of speech doesn't mean that you are free from facing the consequences. You can't say controversial things and expect people not to react. When NWA wrote the song "Fuck Tha Police" they did so hoping to provoke a strong reaction. Perhaps they didn't count on Congressional committees forming to address their album, but you can bet that NWA knew that they were going to piss a lot of people off. They were counting on it to help them sell records.

Heath Campbell doesn't have any talent. As anti-Semites go he leaves a lot to be desired so he picked names for his kids that would evoke a strong reaction. He and his idiot wife were probably surprised and disappointed that they didn't draw significant media attention when they signed Adolf's birth certificate so over the next several years they tried harder. If this story fizzles and the Campbell's don't get an all expenses paid trip on the talk show circuit they're going to have to escalate the offensive. Maybe they'll ruffle feathers in local pizza shops before finally turning to Wal-Mart to place an order for an extra large pie topped with bits of smoked Jew. Maybe Heath will have to convert his back yard into a concentration camp complete with a working gas chamber and an authentic NAZI crematory.

That's pretty extreme and it might be cost prohibitive, especially for a West Jersey hick like Heath. No, they're more likely to pop out another kid and hope that they can pick a name that will really get people angry. Perhaps Hans Curb-stomper Campbell will do the trick. Maybe a daughter named Heeb Killer Campbell is the tonic that will rain down national attention. One thing is certain: if you want attention bad enough, eventually you will get it.

The only thing about this story that bothers me is the fact that Heath is going to get what he wants. That's only going to encourage him to continue on this course of action and it will give other people ideas upon which to expand their own schemes. Some daytime idiot like Tyra Banks will invite him to her show. She'll chastise him and the crowd will boo him roundly but he'll be on TV and that's all that really matters. I'm all for Heath being given a healthy dose of consternation--people need to be held accountable for their actions--but they shouldn't be rewarded with national media attention. In today's society the line between fame and infamy is blurred. There is no such thing as bad publicity and thanks to this AP article Heath is about to get what he's been after all these years.

Democrats are Assholes Too

2008-12-11T06:12:00.000-08:00

By now you must be aware of the fact that Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was arrested by the FBI for trying to "sell" Barack Obama's vacated Senate seat. To anybody familiar with Illinois politics this development comes as no surprise. The surprise is that Obama emerged from the dirt pile that is Illinois politics and managed to project a clean image. Even the most biased pundits in the Fox family can't link Obama to this scandal.

It's important to note that Blagojevich has been at odds with the Democratic party for some time. His own Lt. Governor hates him and the Illinois Democratic caucus has been battling with Blagojevich's corruption for quite some time. The Chicago Tribune has been calling for his impeachment and Blagojevich has been doing everything in his power to intimidate the writers and editors who question him. It's ugly.

After his arrest Blagojevich was released on bond and returned to work, refusing requests from virtually everybody in his party, including Obama, to resign. Blagojevich clearly believes that he is above the law and he intends to stretch this thing out as long as he can.

This is unfortunate for the Democrats because the American people have turned to them after 8 years of Republican corruption. We got tired of watching the antics of people like Tom DeLay and Ted Stevens, against the backdrop of the worst administration since Warren G. Hardings's, and handed the keys to the Democrats.

It's not that we're naive enough to believe that the Democrats are perfect. We know that they're going to screw up because they are, after all, politicians and we accept the fact that 99% of all politicians are self-serving scumbags who would kill us in our sleep if it would further their careers, but I think we all expected the Democrats to pretend they were better. After all the crap this country has dealt with, it's hard to believe that Blagojevich isn't really an actor employed by conservative interests.

But it's not an act. Blagojevich is a Democrat who learned to play the game in the dirtiest political arena we've got. Illinois has always been where the Democrats learn their dirtiest tricks. Unlike most Illinois Democrats, Blagojevich lacked the sense to not get caught which makes it highly probable that he was set up by a much more experienced Democrat with an axe to grind.

Like most Americans I voted exclusively for Democrats this time around. I even voted against a few moderate Republicans who have done well and deserved to be reelected because I felt that the GOP let this country down by not policing itself. I don't think the Democrats are that much better, but I was holding out hope that they would pretend to be and that's what I was voting for. I want my politicians to go back to having enough humility to keep their shady back alley business in the back alley. I know they're cheats and liars. I know they are going to break every promise they make but the overt corruption is disrespectful. Have the decency to put up a front and act like there are rules even if you think they don't apply to you. Barack Obama hasn't even been sworn in and idiots like Blagojevich are already acting like they're above the law.

I think it's time for the Democrats to send the world a message. This is Illinois and Blagojevich is a Chicago guy. They have ways of dealing with these things in Chicago. We're a long way from the days of Al Capone and Frank Nitty, but accidents still happen and people still disappear. He needs to be made an example of and what better place to do it than Illinois.

God's Work

2008-11-18T09:37:00.000-08:00

I don't know exactly what was supposed to happen in THE YEAR 2000...The Rapture...Armageddon...The Apocalypse...The Second Coming...The End of Days...my computer turning into a butter churn...whatever. All I know is that it didn't happen. I used to think that this is because there is no god. It's a pretty outlandish thought for most people to accept but for years I kept hearing people talk about God and Jesus and all of the things that they do but I never saw any evidence of it. Just talk. I lied to my mother all the time and, in spite of her threats to the contrary, he never struck me down. I've placed my hand over a bible and failed to tell the whole truth, with no consequences or repercussions. I've seen people do terrible things and never get taken to task. So I concluded that God was a myth.

Still, in 1999 I wondered if something big was going to happen and, given how annoying I find most Christians to be, I was hoping it would be The Rapture. For years I've listened to Christians talk about this event where they all get sucked up into heaven and the rest of us are left to wallow around in misery. The thing they never seem to realize is that 99% of the misery we deal with every day is caused by Christians who believe they'll be Raptured someday. So to me that was a win/win situation. Yeah, heaven sounds like a great place but I don't think I'll like the people. It's kind of like Boca Raton.

Over the last several years I'm not so sure that this lack of action is a sign that there is no god, but rather a clear indication that god has lost interest in the project. And why wouldn't he? Let's assume that Christians are right and God sent his son, Jesus, down here to get things squared away...it seems like that message has been lost in translation, has it not? Look at all the denominations that fall under the mantle of Christianity. They share similar attributes but the devil is in the details and details are where these denominations bitterly disagree. There's a lot of competition in the Christian market, and by market I mean money.

There's also politics. Religious groups regularly get involved in politics by passing laws that have no effect on them. Rather than mind their own business they hijack the legal process to impose ambiguous ordinances that infringe on civil rights. Recently the Mormon Church poked its polygamist nose in to California's Constitution by managing to pass the infamous Proposition 8, an amendment to the state's constitution that will render homosexual marriages illegal and invalid.

The Stormin' Mormons invested heavily into propaganda that characterized schools as teaching homosexuality even though there is nothing in the curriculum that does any such thing. These so-called Christians even went so far as to argue that homosexual marriages would soon pave the way for perverts of every ilk to marry the objects of their affections be they man or beast or members of NAMBLA.

I know what you're thinking: Aren't these Mormons those freaks who live in Utah and marry their underage cousins? The answer is yes, but various rules and regulations both at the federal and state levels prohibit polygamy and set an age of consent. So Mormons, angry that they can no longer marry dozens of 12 year-old girls in one ceremony, have opted to get even with their oppressors by going after gays. It doesn't seem logical, does it?

Well it is. You see, legal or not Mormons still practice polygamy. They claim they don't but they do. They do it quietly. Utah is not a very populous state and even though it seems like you can't kick over a chunk of halite without uncovering a Mormon they don't make up the entire population. Because of this 85% of Mormon women are married to 8% of Mormon men. That would be the old men who control the money and the church. Now Mormon women aren't very attractive in the first place (Donny Osmond is the sexiest Mormon woman alive) so the 15% that are left for the remaining 92% of the men are the sort of women that drive men to sheep.

As you can imagine, the paucity of available women forces some of these men to evaluate their sexuality and many of them realize that they're actually suppressing homosexual desires. Then you realize that California is a day's drive away and suddenly you have an exodus. That's something churches can't afford. So that's why the Mormons saw fit to ban gay marriage in California...it's all about the tithes. And the sheep...it's possible that Mormon's actually believe the slippery slope argument and those hairy Mormon women really don't want to have to compete with those barnyard hussies. I mean, there's nothing wrong with a torrid ovine affair
but marriage?

So what's that got to do with Jesus and his failure to make an appearance at THE YEAR 2000? Everything. Like I said, I used to think it was a sign that God didn't exist but when I see religiots doing things like burning good books or banning gay marriage I realize that they really don't get it. Jesus was really more of a "mind your own business" sort of guy. He wasn't shrill. He wasn't desperate. He wasn't judgmental. The only thing that seemed to get Jesus worked up was when the church got involved in money and politics. That was really what he railed against. He didn't point out the faults of others, he encouraged people to seek out the truth within themselves.

That's not what Christianity does today. With a handful of exceptions virtually every Christian denomination strives to wield money and power. Nobody seems to practice what Jesus preached. Do you think he would have taken up a fight against gay marriage? Do you think he'd spread lies to further his agenda? Of course not.

Nope. The reason nothing happened in THE YEAR 2000 is because Jesus took one look at how his legacy has been corrupted and walked away. Sorry, folks, the rapture is over. You completely missed the point and now Heaven is closed. Thanks for playing.

What Not to Watch

2008-09-29T12:05:00.000-07:00

De Niro

Pacino

They are considered to be two of the greatest actors of all time and coming soon to a theater near you, they will be on screen together. Righteous Kill will not force on screen sparks by creating an improbably coffee shop scene the way Heat did, this time the top billed actors will be paired throughout the movie…emoting together for the first time.

Pardon me if I don’t rush right out and watch it. Personally I find De Niro and Pacino to be more than a little irritating. Many believe that Pacino’s best work was in Scarface and since then he has been consistently praised and rewarded for delivering more over-the-top performances. It’s almost as is he suffers from some strange form of Tourette’s syndrome that causes him to bark out lines and place heavy emphasis on stray words throughout his dialogue.

De Niro has been an insufferable ass for a long time. He’s seems so wrapped up in his Mafioso persona that every role comes of as an homage to Alec Baldwin’s famous parody of De Niro on Saturday Night Live. De Niro has become a clown. He’s an old guy who just doesn’t get it anymore. It’s too bad nobody has the guts to tell him.

I can predict exactly how this movie is going to work. De Niro will sneer at the camera while Pacino yells. They’ll both flex muscles in the movie and intimidate characters played by actors who are younger and much tougher than either of them. Donnie Wahlberg and 50 Cent will collaborate on the sound track which will be available on iTunes in time for Christmas.

Critics will be careful not to lambaste De Niro or Pacino. If they ruin the movie with their incessant hamming the blame will fall on the director, Jon Avnet. Supporting players will take criticism for not being strong enough to off set the intensity of the two headliners.

Hollywood seems to have this ridiculous fascination with older actors. Not actresses, mind you, but actors. Old guys like De Niro and Pacino never seem to find themselves marginalized by their age even though it’s unlikely that two cops pushing 70 would be doing anything other than planning a golf outing from behind a desk. What’s worse is that geezers like De Niro and Pacino end up having 35 year-old actresses cast as their love interests. Honestly, I think porn is a more admirable pursuit than being caught in a love scene with one of these over-the-hill hacks.

It’s sad because there are a number of phenomenal actors who are in their late 40s and early 50s \who would be more convincing as crusty old cops. The best part about it is these actors aren’t has high on themselves as guys like De Niro and Pacino are. You might end up with a good movie on your hands if you took a leap and cast more realistic actors.

The fact that De Niro and Pacino are in this movies convinces me that it’s not a very good script. When actors of this magnitude are cast the studio is usually trying to blind us with star power so we don’t realize that the plot was flawed and that the dialogue was clunky. Most fans are so enthralled by the audacity of the leading actors that they don’t really stop to consider the fact that the movie stunk.

Well I’m not buying it. I’ve seen enough of De Niro and Pacino over the past 10-15 years to know that their best work is well behind them. Maybe I’ll catch this flick in about four years when it works its way down to basic cable but I won’t be counting the days until that happens.

Luck has nothing to do with it

2008-09-24T03:55:00.000-07:00

When people ask me what Columbus is like I usually tell them that it's a great place to live but you wouldn't want to visit here. It's not exactly the slogan our city's tourism department endorses but it's painfully accurate.

Don't get me wrong, Columbus has plenty to offer. We have a great arts community that coordinates plenty of activities to promote local artists and performers. We have interesting restaurants, bars and night clubs. Columbus actually sponsors festivals and activities throughout the year to engage the public and stimulate economic development. Sadly, none of those things are worth booking a trip to Columbus for. If you live here or have to be in town for something else it's great, but if you book a weekend getaway to Columbus you're going to be disappointed.

We've got minor league baseball and major league soccer, neither of which is worth watching but it's there. Ohio State has a football team people either love or love to hate and the State Fair sets up shop every August providing a great opportunity for people to eat unimaginable deep-fried concoctions or for other people to watch those people eat unimaginable deep-fried concoctions. Again, interesting stuff if you live in the area....not so much if you have to book a flight.

We don't have a great waterfront. Two beige rivers meander through the city and converge downtown but very little has been developed on these shallow waterways. There are no sandy beaches, no towering mountains, no lush forests. Columbus is surrounding by housing developments and farmland. To put it bluntly, Columbus is boring.

And that's OK. The cost of living is manageable, the job market is solid and traffic is generally easy to deal with. It's a great place to live. There's usually not much excitement and that's the way we like it. Excitement can be overrated.

Today is a significant day for Columbus as it marks the first time in 10 days that the entire city has electricity. Back on September 14th the remnants of Hurricane Ike hooked up with a sexy Canadian cold front and enjoyed a blustery romp right on top of Central Ohio. Sustained winds maxed out over 50 miles per hour with gusts exceeding 80. Trees were toppled, power lines were downed and by the end of the day 400,000 people were in the dark. Most of those people were without power for the better part of a week.

The effort to restore power quickly was hampered by how prolific and wide spread the damage was as well as the fact that utility crews were dispatched to Texas to help get people back online after Ike made landfall. Nobody expected Columbus to sustain damage in hurricane force winds.

Most people in Columbus were surprisingly calm about the whole ordeal. Normally weather-related inconveniences are turned into crimes against humanity. Check the reaction later this year when snow isn't removed quickly enough and you'll see what I mean. I really expected more whining when I heard that power would be out for a week.

Some people were upset. Generators were quickly sold out, gas prices stayed high even though none of the Texas refineries were damaged and people couldn't find ice. People weren't happy about pitching thousands of dollars worth of food in some cases but the bitching never got out of line.

Still, there were people who wandered around reminding everybody how fortunate we were to not live on the Gulf Coast. Our misery was trivial when compared with the suffering people endured when Katrina hit New Orleans and the residents of Galveston would be inconvenienced long after Columbus got back to normal. We got off easy. We were lucky.

Bullshit.

Look, I took the storm in stride, I always do. Nature holds all the cards. Sometimes we overcome, sometimes we get the crap kicked out of us. That's just the way it is. But lucky? No. I live in boring-ass, white bread, corn pone Columbus, Ohio because we're not supposed to get hit by hurricanes. That's the sacrifice. If you live close to the beautiful beaches of the Gulf of Mexico you choose to do so knowing that a hurricane could come along and blow your house down. If you live in Southern California you realize that the mother of all quakes could come along and smash your entire existence. If you live in St. Louis you recognize that the Mississippi River will pour over its banks every few years. You accept those risks. You live with them.

You want to know what risks I accept in Columbus? Tornadoes. And not those big trailer park eaters they get in Kansas. Central Ohio sees the occasional F2 or F3 tornado. If my house ever gets nailed by one I'll just grin and bear it because that's the chance I take living here but when the winds swirl at 50 miles an hour or more for six hours I'm not going to smile and count myself lucky. I chose to live in Columbus. I could have taken jobs in Miami, New Orleans or even Galveston. I stayed here because I wasn't willing to accept the risks of living on the volatile Gulf Coast. I chose boring.

I don't blame the people of Galveston and New Orleans for living there. I don't trivialize their plight but once they clean up their mess and repair the damage they go back to the joys of living on the ocean. Those places are major tourist destinations and the people who live there enjoy it. When people in Columbus clean up the mess and fix the damage they go back to that mundane Wonder bread existence nobody else in the world cares about. It's not a fair trade.

I'm not whining. There's a sick side of me that really enjoyed the storm and I was actually disappointed that I was one of the few people to have his power restored within 24 hours. I saw a sustained power outage as a challenge. I was going to build fires and eat neighborhood pets and/or wayward children. I relished the post-apocalyptic existence I was going to be required to eek out for a few days and I was ready. I was ready to fend off needy neighbors and loot grocery stores for the provisions I desperately required. It was going to be fun. I was going to be the king of Clintonville. So I actually welcomed the storm.

Most people didn't. Most people like electricity and cable TV and a general sense of order. I don't begrudge them that. The people of Columbus did a great job handling the adversity this freak storm blew into their lives. I'm actually proud of the way people responded. But don't tell me we were lucky. That's just insulting.

Yowza!

2008-08-29T13:46:00.000-07:00

You know I like Barack Obama and I had every intention of voting for him even though I knew full well he’d be lucky to make it through the first year. We’ve come a long way when it comes to racism in this country but the ever-diminishing herds of inbred, WalMart-shopping, NASCAR fanatics who hate anybody not white and stupid is still dangerous. Up in Golden, Colorado rival biker gangs took time off from their busy schedule of feuding and selling drugs to unite in order to harass Arab news network Al Jazeera as they covered small town America’s reaction to Obama’s nomination. I’m sure they were impressed at all the colorful epithets hundreds of people who can’t even spell “epithet” hurled at them. It was nice for Obama because all of those ignorant crackers forgot to harass (or worse) him.

I knew that John McCain was going to offset his antiquity by tapping a younger running mate. I never thought it would be Sarah Palin and I approve of tapping her. I think we all do. She might be smart, I don’t mean to be sexist but as my black friends like to say: DAMN! Or, as my white friends who try to be black would say: BOOYA!

She’s pretty hot. Not just for a vice presidential candidate either, although Dan Quayle would not have maintained his purity for more than 20 minutes in prison. I don’t know if Dan would have made it through Boy Scout camp without being forced to grab his ankles. Anyway, Dan Quayle’s soft femininity aside, Palin is quite the piece of tail. That might be disrespectful but it’s not like she doesn’t put it out there.

I don’t know anything about her politics but she can impose her economic policy on me anytime. I wouldn’t mind if she violated my civil rights. Hard. And that’s what McCain is counting on. He knows he can gain an edge over Obama because he’s white and has a plain old white name. John McCain: he’s like a big loaf of Wonder bread with the crusts already removed. They don’t even let brides wear such a shade of white because nobody is that pure. McCain can’t beat Obama in a debate but as long as Obama is black and named Obama, that’s all the advantage McCain needs. Watch, when they do debate I bet McCain says Obama’s name like 400 times. Obama…Barack Obama….Barack Hussein Obama…Obama mama…negrobama....

Nobody really cares about the VP. They’re all about image. You have to find a counterpoint to the Presidential candidate in order to appeal to a bigger cross section of voters. In other words, you have to pander to prejudice. So Obama picked an old white guy who talks about coal mines, shot guns and whatever else sounds rugged. McCain can talk about all of those things because he was born before we had them.

I had a feeling that McCain might pick a woman because so many of Hillary’s supporters were disgruntled when Obama beat her for the nomination. I figured it would be a young woman as well. I didn’t think it would be Wonder Woman. Joe Biden doesn’t stand a chance in the VP debates because everybody is going to be looking at her boobs. I know I will and I’m not a boob man. I’m a card carrying member of the ass brigade but I’m not above breaking ranks and casting the occasional vote for a nice set of jugs.

McCain is counting on that because he’s old and ugly. He’s wrinkled and grizzled and old. He served in the Navy when they were still using sails and went to school in a sod house with the other four kids that hadn’t been kidnapped by marauding bands of Huron Indians. He’s grouchy and old. Ancient. Like dirt, but whiter…and older. But how can I look at the Depends-wearing geezer in the corner when there’s a hot chick in the middle of the room. How you doin’?

Now I like to pretend I know about politics but I didn’t know who Sarah Palin was before I heard her named mentioned as McCain’s running mate. I looked her up online but really didn’t get past the image search. I guess she was the Governor of Alaska or is or saw the Governor of Alaska somewhere. I don’t care. She looks like a dominatrix out of a fetish film…or so I might imagine.

How would she run the country if (if?) McCain passed away? Hopefully with an unrelenting desire to whip us all into submission. Look, things are pretty well hosed. We need to just admit that George W. Bush’s idiocy was more powerful than the Constitution. We voided the warranty on our government by putting a moron into office. It’s nice to talk about fixing things, but it’s not going to happen. So in November I’m casting my vote for a great set of boobs and I hope you’ll join me. If we’re on a collision course with disaster we might as well enjoy the view. That’s what John McCain wants, and, damn it, that’s good enough for me.

Fat Guy on a little Bike

2008-08-24T07:25:00.000-07:00

I've been biking to work most of the summer. A bicycle...the kind you pedal. I could even say that I go uphill both ways because a river cuts through the middle of Columbus and creates a valley that forces me to endure a pretty strenuous climb each way. It's not the Pyrenees , but it does make for a good workout. The reasons are many: high gas prices, exercise, vehicular homicide....You know, the usual. I actually enjoy it because I've always enjoyed riding a bike. I think it's because the seat hits my prostate in just the right spot.

My commute is actually respectable at 11 miles one way. That's a total of 22 miles over the course of the day and that's more than most people bike in a month. So I carry the smug satisfaction of being better than all of them. It's pretty rewarding in that regard. I also bike just for the fun of it on the weekends. So yes, my ass does feature a bald patch in the shape of my saddle.

Now don't get the wrong impression. I'm not Lance Armstrong. In fact, I look like I might have eaten Lance Armstrong. I'm a big guy which is a nice way of saying I'm fat. Are there fatter people? Sure, but I still could stand to lose more weight than I'd like to admit because I'm just enough of a girl to be bashful about it.

So there I am pedaling to work and people are thinking, Jesus Christ that poor bike. Or, where's he heading, Krispy Kreme? I smile as they drive by, staring, wondering how that bike hasn't somehow slipped right up my big fat ass. It's some sort of miracle.

When people ask me about my commute disbelief seems to wash over their faces. I get the fish eye. 11 miles? No way. They offer faint patronizing praise that is usually reserved for Special Olympians. I know they don't believe me and that's OK because I'm not doing it for them.

It just drives home the point that losing weight is hard. Not technically speaking, of course, but knowing you have to eat less and exercise more and consistently following through with it are two very different things.

I'm not one of these chunks who wants sympathy. I'm responsible for myself and it's a work in progress. Biking is a small part of it and if I'm being honest the fact that I can maintain a relatively high level of physical activity makes me happy. I'm not one of those people who needs to rest for 10 minutes after squeezing his big fat ass into his car. So that's something, and for now it'll do. For now.

Girlie Man

2008-08-21T07:19:00.000-07:00

I like to think of myself as a man but lately I’m wondering. The Olympics are going on right now and I don’t care. College football season is ready to start and I’m not excited and my beloved Cleveland Browns are supposed to be a contender this year and I’m not memorizing the schedule.

This is really bad because I write a sports blog. I think I enjoy sports but for some reason I’m not passionate about them any more. I don’t know why. I still have balls. I stumbled over a football in the hallway just this morning and I even played basketball last week. I enjoy my weekly soccer matches. I’m just not feeling the spectator side of things.

There’s just so much coverage. Everywhere I go it’s sports, sports, sports. That used to be cool. I never thought I’d get sick of ESPN but here I am barfing away. I never really cared for Bob Costas but now I want to set him on fire. He’s such a schmuck. Does he lay it on thick. When he’s waxing philosophically I have to check the channel to make sure I’m not watching Oxygen or Lifetime.

I’m convinced that it’s the Olympics. If you read my blogs at all you might get the impression that I’m just a little bit of a cynic and that acerbic little chip in my brain makes it hard to swallow the schmaltz NBC is dousing the games in. Just the other day I told a guy that I’ll wait for conformation on the drug test results before I get excited about Michael Phelps, but the truth is I never will because I take no interest in swimming. Yes, he won eight gold medals but is it really that big a deal? He’s a swimmer so he gets more chances to medal than anybody else. It would be like running the 100 meter dash with different shoe laces. Who cares? Not me.

Well, excuse me.

It’s not like anybody else does. We pretend to care once every four years but by the time they blow out the torch we’ve forgotten about everything that happened. And all of these sports guys talk about how great the games are. Why? I used to think it was cool to set aside politics for a few days and play some games but that doesn’t happen. The games are full of politics…petty little politics like scoring criteria and degrees of difficulty. Boring.

I love how sports guys will completely overstate the significance of an athlete or a sports-related event. The only people who think that way are sports guys who want to write a sappy book like Field of Dreams. Most of us don’t care. I like sports and I don’t care.

Can we please put things back into perspective? These are just games. It’s supposed to be mindless entertainment. Let’s stop talking in superlatives and tone down the drama.

Yes I know, I’ll leave my man points at the door as I leave. It was nice while it lasted.

Now, where my home girls at?

But what about the Children?

2008-07-12T05:36:00.000-07:00

Pro-Lifers are extremely upset this election because nobody is pandering to them. John McCain is one of those moderate Republicans who doesn't like to talk about abortion and Barack Obama is a Democrat which makes him more evil than the anti-Christ.

I've always been a pro-choice guy because as a guy I want the option of abortion available to me if I become pregnant. I know that such a thing is scientifically impossible but with my luck the minute they permanently ban abortion I'll get knocked up.

It's not the pregnancy that frightens me, the logistics of delivering the baby are troubling. I'd either need a c-section, which would require cutting a hole in my abdominal wall, or that baby would have to work it's way down my urethra. I watched a guy force out a bladder stone once and it seemed painful. I happen to know for a fact that babies are bigger than bladder stones. My penis would look like a party favor. And no doctor would believe me. They'd think I was sticking firecrackers in my pee-pee hole. Again.

I've made this argument, sans the exploding penis, to Pro-Lifers and they always seem annoyed. That can't happen, they always say. I find this perplexing because most Pro-Life types seem pretty convinced that Jesus walked on water, healed lepers, turned water into wine and managed to be resurrected. They take all of these crazy fables in the bible literally but can't seem to wrap their minds around the possibility that I might have female parts hidden somewhere in my abdominal cavity. If these people believe that god magically knocked up Mary why is it hard to believe that this same god would want to screw with a non-believer like me?

So this election is all about the babies. The poor unborn children who will never see the light of day. What kills me is that once these precious miracles see the light of day the Pro-Lifers call it a day. Millions of children are put up for adoption and they never find homes. Where are these Pro-Lifers? Another ironic thing about Pro-Lifers is that they are almost always opposed to things like welfare and affirmative action. Interesting....it seems that the fetus is more important than the baby.

Not only do Pro-Lifers not adopt these unwanted babies, they work hard to ensure that homosexuals don't either. How's that for selfish and misguided?

Pro-Lifers love to mock the Pro-Choice crowd by calling us Pro-Abortion, or Pro-Murder. So I guess we should call them Pro-Abuse, Pro-Neglect, and Pro-Poverty. The vast majority of Pro-Lifers take time out of their family planning clinic harassment schedules to support the fulfillment of the death penalty but the irony of hurling around the Pro-Murder moniker seems lost on them. It's because God wants it that way, I suppose...but what if God wants that baby aborted? Maybe he's guiding that women to the clinic to rid the world of the next Adolph Hitler, Joseph Stalin, or Jerry Falwell.

The thing that kills me about Pro-Lifers is the fact that they love to characterize women who seek abortion as a means to terminate an unwanted pregnancy as sexually reckless sluts who use abortion as a means of birth control. This is not true. Abortion is too expensive to use it as an alternative form of birth control. Most of the women who seek abortion as an option only do it once and some of them are married women, with children, who simply can't afford to take care of one more child.

Lump all those Pro-Life people in with the lunatics who bomb abortion clinics and they cry foul. It's unfair to generalize about them even though their weapon of choice is the aspersion.

It's impossible to have a reasonable discussion with Pro-Lifers because so many of them believe that "god" is the ultimate trump card. They're like Ice Cube slamming his last domino on the table in Boys in the Hood yelling, "Domino, motherfucker!" Except, of course they yell Jesus. But you have to do it right. To these crackpots Jesus is a four syllable name. Say it with me: JEE-HEE-ZUS-UH

What kills me is the fact that this god they talk about didn't have the foresight to properly codify abortion in the 10 Commandments. Pro-Lifers argue that it's right there under Though Shalt Not Kill, but I checked the original stone tablets, which are a binding agreement, and saw no such clarification. If we're going to take the Commandments literally shouldn't we also suspend the death penalty?

Most Pro-Lifers will make an exception when the mother's life is in danger. Some won't, apparently the fetus trumps everything to them, but most will cut mom a little slack if she's about to die. That's nice, but God didn't clarify that exception either. You'd think that this is because god gives us credit for having common sense but take a long hard look at religion in general and you'll see a paucity of common sense. I'd expect an omnipresent being to anticipate confusion. That's the problem with trying to look at this from a biblical perspective. God simply didn't do a good job explaining himself.

Abortion has always been a lip service issue for presidential candidates, particularly Republicans who have to cater to the segment of their base that is Pro-Life. McCain isn't exactly Pro-Choice but he's not as Pro-Life as his party's base wants him to be. The official Republican Platform does feature a plank that calls for a national ban on abortion with no exceptions while McCain has long been a proponent of changing the platform to relax the stance. Obama is taking the Jimmy Carter approach to abortion which is to say that he is morally opposed to abortion on a personal level but that he would not seek to support legislation that would impose his moral views on others.

So regardless of what happens this November, abortion will remain legal for another four years. That's good news for me because I don't know nothing about birthing no babies.

Cultural Concerns

2008-06-04T12:36:00.000-07:00

Pop or Soda?

When you want a carbonated soft drink do you ask for a soda or a pop? There’s really no right or wrong answer but don’t tell that to the soda people. People who say soda give people who say pop a hard time, even to the point of ignoring the pop person altogether. Meanwhile soda people can travel deep into the heart of pop country and order a soda without getting so much as a cross stare. Soda people say it’s because pop people are stupid but it’s really because we wiped boogers on the rims of the cans.

The sheer variety of carbonated soft drinks makes ordering one by a generic moniker a risky proposition. Most sane people don’t like Dr. Pepper or his ne’er do well cousin, Mr. Pibb. Mountain Dew is not the same thing as Fresca and there are people who still insist that there is a difference between Coke and Pepsi even though a recent Mythbusters episode proved that they are the exact same product. With so many options, be they real or imagined, one must be specific. Even if you don’t care what you get, the person retrieving the product needs to know which ball park to reach in.

So the debate is moot except for when a person is explaining where they’re off to.

There is another debate that seems to be raging and this one has serious implications:

Wal-Mart vs. Target

I’m a Target person and I say that with pride. Not because I actually think that Target is better or simply less evil that Wal-Mart. They’re both soulless retailers who offer low prices at the expense of exploited foreign workers. I get that. I do believe Wal-Mart is slightly more unscrupulous than Target but only slightly. And I believe Target does offer nicer stuff but that’s only because of demand.

Shoppers make the difference and that’s why I firmly plant myself in the Target camp. Wal-Mart shoppers are just creepy. I don’t know if it’s the inbreeding, bad water or a combination of both but the pale, morbidly obese rednecks who shop at Wal-Mart make me feel like a black panther at a NASCAR event. Actually, I just feel like a moderately intelligent white guy at a NASCAR event which is about as out of place as a person can feel.

I really wish I could stomach the experience of shopping at Wal-Mart because I love having my ego stroked. It’s nice to be the smartest guy for two square kilometers but the sense of superiority is always overwhelmed by the sickening feeling that there’s a collective mind conspiring to undermine me, like something out of a bad science fiction movie.

What I like about Target is the fact that the brand doesn’t imprint itself on me. Wal-Mart people always stand out even in weird places. On a recent camping trip I was able to pick out the Wal-Martians by the gargantuan Ozark Trail tents they were setting up. My suspicions were confirmed when everybody with the hideous Ozark Trail tent turned on their radios in unison to follow that weekend’s NASCAR race. As the frantic cadence of the announcer repetitively washed over me I could feel brain cells wither and die. I remain convinced that my brain physically smoothed over just a bit and that some of my higher cerebral functions, such as completing this phrase with something witty, were permanently incapacitated. It’s interesting because on the few occasions I’ve been to Wal-Mart I actually felt myself getting dumber.

Maybe Wal-Mart and NASCAR are using the same device. Both organizations rely heavily on stupidity...it’s their number one demographic. I bet Wal-Mart probably stumbled upon the benefits of stupid customers when they were experimenting with ways to dumb down their employees. How else do you explain those big idiotic grins on the faces of the greeters? Welcome to Walmart. Do you suppose the real them is trapped behind the facade or are they just dead inside? Anyway, the mind-numbing had an impact on customers and Wal-Mart quickly realized that if they put a smiley face next to a price people would buy it. If you track the trends you'll notice that NASCAR's popularity has grown with Wal-Mart's increasing market share. People go into Wal-Mart for low prices, but they come out race fans.

As for NASCAR, you’re talking about a bunch of cars driving in a circle for three hours. A race is one thing but a bunch of yahoos turning left for 500 miles is painful. Unless you’re the kind of person who can end up missing the exit to work because the car in front of you had one of those crystals hanging from the review mirror, NASCAR is something you lose interest in after about 30 seconds. That’s why NASCAR needs stupid. It's also why NASCAR is so popular in the South.

You know, that's an interesting point to make in the whole dry heat argument. The next time somebody from Arizona gets upset because you dismiss their triple digit temps as dry, mention the strange correlation between humidity and stupidity as witnessed in the Deep South. It might not have any scientific merit but I bet it ends the argument. I guarantee it ends the argument.

Cracker Barrel is another place that seems to attract that crowd and it’s the sort of place where stupid hangs in the air like cheap perfume. You might even be able to smell it if not for the cloying scent of cheap perfume. Cracker Barrel is where Wal-Martians go after Tony Stewart flips whoever won the race off. People say it exudes Southern charm. I think it looks like the clubhouse at a fancy trailer park. Look, Maude, they made a wind jingly thing out of forks and spoons.

Feeling Groovy?

2008-05-22T12:44:00.000-07:00

I was born in 1970 which means I’m pretty much the backbone of Generation X. I don’t really know what that means but thanks to our society's endless need to label everything that’s the way it is.

I grew up listening to my grandparents congratulate themselves for surviving the Great Depression and winning World War 2 while the Baby Boomers patted themselves on the back for the 60s. They were revolutionaries, man. Meanwhile everything important had been handled and the world was going to end in THE YEAR 2000 but I was still getting grief for being such a slacker.

Now the center mass of the Baby Boom Generation has turned 60 and American Consumerism is succinctly illustrating just how lame they are. No generation of senior citizens has been coddled and catered to quite like these rebellious movers and shakers who claim to have set the world on its axis.

I don’t mean any disrespect but in addition to Dennis Hopper schilling some sort of investment portfolio designed to help Boomers go gently into that good night while they pretend to rage against the dying of the light by spending money, there are numerous marketing campaigns that make it clear that this generation is a lot more Baby than Boom.

Take the Jitterbug. This is a cellular phone marketed to the AARP set. In fact they invest heavily in AARP advertising. Jitterbug’s gimmick is that there are no gimmicks. They’ve eliminated all of those dad-burned buttons and features like cameras and full color screens. It’s easy to use because, after all, old people are stupid.

Trek has followed up on that angle by marketing a three-speed bicycle that automatically shifts. It hearkens back to one of those clunky old cruisers, has a big springy seat and promises to help you “feel like a kid again”. Believe me, once Alzheimer's sets in...you will any way.

Trek is trying to keep its options open and does market the bike to a younger crowd as well but considering that when I was a kid we actually wanted as many gears as you could cram on a sprocket, I think it’s safe to say the target demographic is the 60 and over crowd. The extra wide seat won’t rip a hole in your Depends and there’s a convenient storage compartment for your spare teeth.

What happened to I hope I die before I get old? How can it be that the generation that was once defined by something as wild as Woodstock is now hobbling gleefully into the bliss of senility? I know that you can’t stay young forever but do you have to embrace the cliché of being old?

What really irks me is the fact that I can’t seem to get a break. Growing up I was bombarded with movies about Vietnam and television shows about hippies turning 30. Now I’m getting hit with movies like the Bucket List where a couple of geezers try to live it up before they keel over. At least my grandparents had the decency to step aside and let the faster train roll on by. When life got to be more than they could handle they checked into Sunnyvale Acres and got by on cards and the occasional visit. Baby Boomers are turning the whole world into a retirement community. It’s OK is you want to be lame, just don’t drag the rest of us down with you. Pull over to the right and let the rest of us by.

Get out of the way, Gramps

2008-05-12T11:49:00.001-07:00

Contrary to what John McCain says, Hamas has not endorsed Barack Obama. That’s just not something Hamas would do. Even if they thought Obama might give them an audience, no Hamas leader would risk his neck by publicly endorsing an American Presidential candidate. Of course in the modern era of politics facts aren’t important. Photo ops and sound bites make or break you. There is one fact that nobody can escape: John McCain is old. We’re not talking older McCain is just plain old.

I know, we aren’t supposed to discriminate based on age. Well that’s a great idea but when it comes to elected officials we already do. Nobody younger than 35 can serve as the President of the United States. Apparently people under the age of 35 are too naïve and inexperienced to grasp the nuances of public policy and foreign relations. It doesn’t matter that our current President might have an IQ under 35 giving him the mind of a hamster, age is more important than smarts.

So why should we leave the other end of the lifespan open? When that phone rings at 3:00am do you really want Pappy fumbling around for his dentures? I don’t. I also don’t want him nodding off during cabinet meetings or regaling important foreign officials with highly inappropriate stories about his days in the Navy. Morocco? I knew a great whore from Morocco…

Even if McCain is all there, which doesn’t seem to be the case, There is the simple inevitability of the cycle of life. McCain is practically knocking on death’s door. He could go gently into that good night any day now. Granted, life doesn’t come with any guarantees…other than the fact that it will end which is really the point. In addition to the everyday risks we all face (car accidents, plan crashes, meteors, killer bees, flesh eating bacteria, Glen Close…) McCain’s on the edge of his own mortality. It's like we're all playing Russian Roulette excpet he's got five chambers loaded.

Making matters worse is the fact that McCain’s logged more mileage on that wrinkled old carcass he calls a body. He was tortured in Vietnam for five years. You have to respect the price he paid to serve his country but if smoking can shave 10 years off your life what does torture do? It’s a virtual miracle that the old coot is still breathing but his luck won’t last forever. In fact, it probably won’t last through the first year. Presindets are expected to put in long hours, and naps during Matlock at 1400 hours just won't cut it. Can McCain put in 16 hour days? I know Bush didn't but we see how that's turned out.

We’ve seen signs that he’s slipping. Erroneously crediting Hamas with endorsing Obama is just a cheeky error in judgement but this guy got the players in the Iraq mess mixed up. Sure, most people have trouble keeping Sunni and Shiite Muslims straight but McCain’s talking about keeping troops over there for another 100 years or so. It would be nice if he had some idea who they’ll be fighting and why. If McCain can’t keep the friends and foes straight we’re going to see things get worse before they get better.

Don’t get me wrong, old people are great but there’s a reason we send them off to nursing homes as soon as we can get the power of attorney form signed. McCain might be fit to serve a term as the president of his shuffle board club, but I’m not so sure about the White House. Age might be nothing but a number but so is a golf score. When it comes to keeping this country on the green McCain is a few strokes over par.

She's just being Miley

2008-05-02T11:03:00.000-07:00

Fatherly Love?

(photo by Annie Leibovitz...Vanity Fair)

Apparently Miley Cyrus didn’t know that posing in the nude is sexual. Now that her spread in Vanity Fair has stirred up controversy among the puritanical core of her fan base, Miley is playing the role of the victim. She’s embarrassed by the photos and feels betrayed by the photographer, Annie Leibovitz.

To use the vernacular of Miley’s typical fan: What-ev.

Look, sweetheart, you took all your clothes off and wrapped yourself up in a satin sheet. What did you think that shoot was about?

Of course Miley knew damned well what she was doing. She’s only 15 but she’s been an international superstar for the past few years. Disney’s been selling her sex in that plausibly deniable way they'vemastered in all their years of pimping kids, so don’t tell me Miley didn’t go into this shoot with eyes wide open.

And that’s OK. At 15, Miley should want to shed the Hannah Montana persona and be herself, which happens to be a cornpone country singer with decent looks, a great body and average vocals. Combine that with schmaltzy chicken-fried bloodlines courtesy of achy-breaky Billy Ray and you’ve got a CMT sensation on your hands.

Speaking of Billy, he’s in the shoot with his daughter. In fact he’s in one of the most disturbing photographs in the history of pop culture. He’s staring wistfully in the distance, wearing another regrettable hairdo and a cheesy post-Eurotrashian leather vest while Miley lies across his lap staring into the camera with bedroom eyes. It would be a great sensual picture if not for the heaping helping of incestuous ick. Annie Leibovitz might be innocent of misleading Miley but she did snap that nasty picture. It made me think back to the story about Miley attending a so-called “Purity Party” with her dad where she promised to protect her cherry for him. Ewww!

EWWWWWW!

EWWWWWW!

If you want to blame anybody for the shoot blame him. He’s supposed to be her father and most fathers would have blown their tops the minute their daughter was asked to remove hers. Of course, Billy’s parental credentials were already in question before the shoot. While we don’t know the whole story we do know that Miley got cast as Hannah Montana a few years ago, Billy packed up the family and moved to Beverly…Hills, that is. Somehow he managed to parlay Miley’s role into a supporting gig playing Hannah Montana’s dad and the rest is history. Billy turned the shows popularity into a couple of recent hits for himself and, if he’s half as cunning managing his career as he’s been with his daughter’s, he might avoid becoming a pop culture punch line for the second time in his life.

In all honesty there’s nothing wrong with Miley’s coming out party. Some of the pictures were a little sexy. As a guy who’s far too old to be ogling girls Miley’s age it’s a little unnerving because it forces me to draw an internal line somewhere between acknowledging that she’s a cute kid and sneaking off to the men’s room for a midday flogging. I think I’m mature enough to handle it.

The people freaking out are the hoards of idiot parents out there responsible for selling out every Hannah Montana concert. They have daughters that worship Hannah/Miley. What will this do? Well, if Miley has that much of an influence over your child you were probably screwed long before Miley got naked.

Even if you’re a decent parent who has done a good job of keeping the whole Hannah Montana craze in perspective there’s a pretty good chance that your daughter was going to develop a sexual appetite some where in the middle of her teenage years. Don’t blame Miley, Annie, Billy, or Liberals. There’s a little thing called biology that triggers sexual behavior around the same time the baby-making bits start working.

Rather than hide your kids from sex and throw wild tizzies whenever the next Lindsay/Hilary/Miley starts to get her freak on you might want to engage in a realistic discussion about sexuality. Instead of laying down mandates such as: NO SEX UNTIL YOU’RE MARRIED, perhaps more realistic parameters are in order. After all, we’ve pretty much established that religion and Purity Pacts simply don’t work. If anything those alternatives to reality prove to be counterproductive. Sure, kids might not be engaging in traditional baby-making vaginal intercourse but they’re doing everything else you can think of and quite a few things you probably can’t imagine. Have gun will holster. Where there’s a hole there’s a lay.

Miley’s got no reason to feel embarrassed or ashamed of those pictures. She doesn’t have to apologize for wanting to feel sexy. At 15, her parents have the ability to sign off on things like the Vanity Fair piece so if you want to blame anybody blame Billy Ray, but be careful with doling it out. Incestuous pictures notwithstanding, Billy Ray probably knows his daughter and might have felt that she was mature enough to handle the adult context of those pics more importantly, Billy Ray doesn’t have to consider what impact his daughter’s career path might have on millions of girls around the world.

It’s disappointing to see the Cyrus family turn tail and run from the outrage. Billy Ray’s claiming that the more illicit pictures, such as the seductive baby in a bed sheet shot that’s got everybody fuming, occurred after he left. Maybe that’s true but there’s still the one where he’s got Miley, in skin tight jeans and a belly shirt, apparently writhing on his lap. He was there for that, wasn’t he?

Pope Bless Us...Pope Bless Us Everyone

2008-04-16T13:51:00.000-07:00

Pope Benedict is one hell of a guy. He recently expressed embarrassment over the Catholic sex scandal that seemed quite prolific a few years ago. He also vowed that pedophiles would not be allowed to join the clergy.

So does that mean they were allowed to join before?

That’s all fine and dandy but the fact remains that the church conspired to sweep the problem under the rug. Families were coerced into secrecy and repeat offenders were transferred to other positions within the church. Furthermore, Catholic officials stonewalled legal investigations by playing the separation of church and state card. How does Benedict feel about that?

I haven’t read anything about the Vatican launching an investigation into the scandal and holding people accountable and Benedict hasn’t explained how he plans to keep pedophiles out. I guess you could roll through a few slides of naked boys during the third interview and see if the prospective priest pitches a tent. Chances are most bishops probably have a stash of porn right out of the NAMBLA catalogue.

The reality is that you can’t stop pedophiles. They’re sneaky which is why they gravitate toward positions of trust like priests, teachers, scout leaders and the US House of Representatives. The only thing you can do is take their opportunities to pray/prey on children. That’s hard to do for the Catholic Church seeing as how they think God’s got it all under control.

Of course the only reason this is even an issue is because Pope Benedict is visiting the US. Now why is it he gets to have dinner at the White House and bend the President’s ear while other religious fundamentalists are characterized as terrorists?

Catholicism is funny. Prayers are really chants, many of which are mumbled in Latin. Services are orchestrated events where people stand, sit and kneel according to a strict routine practiced over years and years. You can’t walk around a Catholic Church without running into a collection box for one thing or another. I’ve even seen churches that have different price points for various candles. A little helpful hint: the big candles have more praying power.

Catholics don’t do a whole lot of bible thumping which makes them much easier to get along with than your average evangelical Christian who thinks they’ll get better seats in heaven if they can convert you but Catholics do tend to exude a sense of arrogance about their faith. They just don’t know why. The church starts in with religious programming so early that Catholics can’t express any point at which they made a choice to believe. It’s not faith, it’s ritual. Even the E & C Catholics fall victim to that weird spiritual signal that grows stronger around the major holidays. Everybody practices lent, gets ashes smeared on their foreheads and goes to midnight mass even though they would set foot in a church any other day out of the year.

Catholics will even throw the term “cult” around to describe other religions. They’ll mock the snake-handling hillbillies of Eastern Kentucky, and dismiss the practice of speaking in tongues as nonsense even though they’ll sing an entire hymn in an ancient language they don’t even understand.

Then you have the Pope. One day he’s just a guy who happens to be a Cardinal, then some smoke belches out of a pipe in Rome and suddenly he’s better than everybody else. Catholics practically worship the guy which seems to be a bit of a violation of the 10 commandments. Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

Catholics also have saints which are supposedly people who are in heaven designated to perform specific miraculous functions. Saint Christopher is the patron saint of travelers so you pray to him that those fumes you’ve been driving on for the last ten minutes hold out to the next gas station. Saint Peter can help you with your erection; St. Paul is the patron saint of people who are overshadowed by their more popular twin; St. Peter Paul comes with or without almonds. One of the Saints Mary is the blessed virgin and the other is a blessed whore.

It’s all very confusing and more than a little frightening. Catholics even practice a gruesome ritual of eating the body of Christ and washing it down with his blood. And we think Wiccans are weird. Wiccans don’t eat Jesus, promote NAZIs to the highest rank in their organization or harbor pedophiles. Yet every time the grand Pooh-Bah of Catholicism comes to town in his wacky little bubble-mobile everybody lines up to pay their respects.

Too Black, too strong

2008-03-20T13:49:00.000-07:00

I’m confused. Ever since Barack Obama through his hat into the presidential race people have been trying to convince me that he’s not black. I’ve seen pictures of him decked out in East African attire and I’ve been reminded over and over again that his middle name is Hussein.

My brother's middle name is Vernon, so you'll forgive me if I sypathize with Obama on that one. Parents make mistakes and middle names are where you can find most of them.

I’ve had trouble with that because my eyes tell me that Obama is black. He might not sag his pants and use cool words like Fah-shizzle but he’s definitely black. In fact I would guess that most white people would take one look at him walking down the street and immediately lock their doors but that didn't stop his opponents from trying to dilute his ethnicity.

Now I’m being told that Obama is, in fact, as black as they come. He might even be too black. He goes to a church that was once run by a pastor who sometimes expresses a little bit of anger about this country and the way it’s treated minorities. This, of course, makes him a racist and anybody in his church must be as well.

Never mind the fact that Jeremiah Wright has never called for anything as outlandish as segregation, nor has he affiliated himself with any organization that seeks to do harm to others. Wright is angry with white society and that makes him a racist. Because Obama goes to his church, that makes Obama a racist too.

Where does Jeremiah Wright get off? How dare he insinuate that the attacks of 9-11 were the tragic result of a misguided foreign policy that pressured Middle Eastern leaders to keep oil prices low? What right does he have to question the difference between the way the federal government responded to New York after 9-11 and the manner in which it handled Hurricane Katrina. There is no comparison…one was a sneak attack and the other was a well-documented distaster that unfolded with tedious predictability.

Obama even has the audacity to make excuses for his Pastor. As if living though segregation and the violence associated with the Civil Rights movement of the 60s gives an old black man reason to have a chip on his shoulder.

Sean Hannity made a great point: Wright’s comments don’t necessarily mean that Obama is a racist and an anti-Semite, but what if he is? Can we take that chance? I would be inclined to say no.

Of course that would be if the Republican Party hadn’t already established precedent.

Think back to John Ashcroft, a man who was appointed to the office of Attorney General by George W. Bush. He stood up at Bob Jones University and complimented them for enforcing a rigid moral code of conduct that included a ban on interracial dating. That’s not much of a surprise coming from a President who signed off on a smear campaign that falsely accused John McCain of being father to an interracial child, but it’s still pretty scary.

Even before Bush played the Good Ol’ Boy card with the inbred Wal-Mart shoppers in the Deep South, the Republican Party carefully crafted a method for pandering to bigots. Nixon curried a lot of favor in the South by actively campaigning against affirmative action and implying that the states should determine whether or not to be segregated. A few years later, Ronal Reagan played the same card, touring the South with a complex assortment of winks, nudges and handshakes with Grand Wizards. Reagan even supported the Apartheid Government in South African and called Nelson Mandela a terrorist.

Think about that: a terrorist. And these conservative pundits want to question Obama’s integrity because his pastor can get a little worked up about what this country has done to people of color?

I’m not buying it.

Of course conservatives aren't alone. Geraldine Ferraro actually had the gall to say that Obama is in the position he's in because he's black. She even stated that he's lucky he's black. Really? This coming from a woman whose claim to fame is being a gimmick to help Walter Yawn-dale score points with the female vote. Isn't that the trinket calling the token cheap?

After suffering through a righteous flurry of criticism, Ferraro stepped away from Hillary's campaign but she stands behind what she said. Then she added "I think they're attacking me because I'm white."

And we wonder why Jeremiah Wright's got a chip on his shoulder.

Lying: It's What we do best.

2008-02-19T13:12:00.000-08:00

Andy Pettite, in case you don’t know, is a professional baseball player who happens to be BFFs with Roger Clemens. Both were named in the dreaded Mitchell Report as performance enhancing drug users. Clemens initially bit his tongue while he waited for his attorneys to craft a defense while Pettite confessed that he did use Human Growth Hormone to recover from an injury. Clemens has proven himself to be one of the biggest assholes on the face of the earth as he clumsily points the finger at everybody but himself.

Both of them are lying. Pettite doesn’t think he’s a cheater and he even tossed the GOD card out during a press conference. Somehow GOD told him that it was OK to take HGH, apparently as long as he didn’t try to throw a perfect game or break any records because then it would count as cheating. It’s nice to see that GOD has the time to advise Andy Pettite but can’t seem to clear his schedule off for issues like poverty, famine and the Bush Administration. Nice work up there, big guy. Pettite apparently doesn't know that every great lie starts with those three little letters: G-O-D. When people pray on someting it means they conspired. If somebody claims that they're at peace with Jesus it's because they know the rest of the world is going to see them for the deceitful frauds that they are. Sure, use Jesus as a character witness, it's not like he'll refute it.

Pettite even testified that Clemens told him that he used HGH too. Now Clemens is calling his lover..I mean butt buddy…everything just short of a liar. Andy don’t hear so good, and he miss-remembers things. My mom told me to take b-12 shots. My wife takes HGH. Sure Rocket, we believe you.

This is just the latest in a long line of losing arguments. Why do people try to save face when the shit has hit the fan and splattered everything thing they own? You made the bed, go ahead and lay in it.

I think about Roger Clemens stumbling over his words and deflecting blame like Wonder Woman bouncing bullets off of her bracelets and wonder why he didn’t throw the high heat. Just admit that you took steroids. Take this imaginary transcript:

Shameless Congressional Bully: Did you take performance enhancing drugs. Mr. Clemens? And I remind you that you are under oath.

Roger Clemens’ big fat face: Yep.

Flat-chested Congressional Harpy: I’m sorry, can you repeat that?

Fat Face: Yes. I took performance enhancing drugs.

Bald, rat-like Congressional troll: Why did you take them?

Clemens: To play better, stupid.

Aside from a lot of gaveling and other elected officials rephrasing questions to get more face time on ESPN rather than CSPAN, the whole ordeal would have ended right there. Other than a lot of stupid posturing there’s nothing more to say. Roger Clemens doesn’t care if some 15 year-old in Pottsville takes steroids and he shouldn’t. As long as the league was looking the other way and the criminal justice system put steroids somewhere below counterfeit Groucho Glasses on the list of enforcement priorities Clemens did what any other aging athlete would do. That doesn’t make him a hero but being honest about it would have.

Brutal honesty is the best policy. I love Mel Gibson as an actor but I was really disappointed with his response to the whole anti-Semitic rant ordeal. Rather than meeting with Rabbinical leaders and asking for forgiveness Mel should have just admitted that he doesn’t like Jews:

By now you’ve all heard about my drunken rant in the back of a cop car. Let me just state for the record that those Malibu cops are just a bunch of glorified meter maids who don’t protect anything other than a front row seat at Krispy Kreme.

I’d also like to say that I don’t like Jews. I believe that Jews killed Jesus and I’m harboring a grudge on that one. It’s not personal, it’s theology. Hitler was way out of line with the Holocaust but I kind of get where he was coming from. Sorry if that offends you, that’s just how I feel.

That’s harsh stuff and I don’t agree with the sentiment but I’d have to give the guy props for being honest. It’s more refreshing than running to the nearest rehab clinic to hide behind substance abuse.

Bill Clinton dodged a qualified bullet when he said he didn’t inhale. What he should have said is that he ate it in a brownie instead. And that line about not liking it? Please. Everybody likes it. Bill should have said:

Dude, I play the Sax….of course I use marijuana. I only went into politics because I got tired of smoking shake and scraping resin out of my bong. I’m gonna be smoking that endo, baby. All the way to the White Hizzie.

If he had been honest about his love affair with ganja he could have easily altered his testimony when asked about his affair with Monica Lewinsky:

I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky but I was so stoned I could have been raped by Rush Limbaugh and I wouldn’t have noticed.

And speaking of Rush, I would have been forced to give him credit if he would have had the nerve to face his drug scandal with a little candor:

Ladies and Gentlemen it’s true that I, Rush Limbaugh, am hooked on narcotics. I like to get low. I know I’m on record as stating that drug addicts should be locked up in prison and I still believe that. I also believe that an exception should be made in the case of all rich white men. I didn’t think I had to clarify that being a Republican but there it is. Now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to have my illegal immigrant housekeeper score me an ounce of Afghan Gold and I’m going to melt away in the corner.

Imagine how refreshing it would be. George W. Bush could admit that Dick Cheney’s calling all the shots, except for the one that hit Harry Whittington in the face of course and Dick Cheney could admit that they stopped thinking about 9-11 on 9-13. Where do you go from there? There’s no story when the truth comes out.

What would we do if OJ Simpson came out and admitted that he did kill Nicole and Ron, then stuck out his tongue and said nyah, nyah? Yeah, I killed the bitch and that little boy toy of hers too. So kiss my black ass. Hard core? Yes, but how do you deal with it? We can’t do anything about it and the closure of him finally putting any speculation to rest would allow OJ and the whole stupid saga to fade into sweet anonymity. Nobody really cares that he’s free...nobody outside of the Brown and Goldman families cares about the victims. The only reason this case is still an issue is because of OJ, but if he fesses up we’ve got nothing to fret over.

Of course it’s never going to happen. We’re born to lie. We learn at a very early age that honesty is only the best policy when somebody else is to blame. Think about it, do you remember that first time your mom coaxed the truth out of you by promising she wouldn’t be mad? That was the last time wasn’t it?

Republicans trim roster, but what game will they play?

2008-02-08T09:05:00.000-08:00

Mitt Romney closed out his presidential campaign stating that he needs to step aside so the Democrats don’t win. What really happened is that the big cronies in the GOP camp promised him a spot on the ticket. He had a great run but there’s only room for one religious crackpot in the presidential race and the people have spoken. They’d rather have a freak who actually believes the world is 6,000 years old in the White House than a Mormon.

It figures. After all, Mormonism is just a much older version of scientology. The religions were created in very much the same way. We know that Scientology was invented by a mediocre-at-best science fiction writer who concocted a bogus religion in the midst of a year-long bender. Amidst a haze of drugs, alcohol and unsavory women, L. Ron Hubbard drafted Dianetics. What started off as a joke between friends morphed into a very serious cult that has attracted people rich and powerful enough to put the kibosh on public mockery.

Mormons didn’t have Tom Cruise and John Travolta on their side way back when Joseph Smith claimed to have translated religious texts from ancient golden plates back in the early 1800s so the handful of people who read the Book of Mormon and actually believed it wandered westward until they ended up in the middle of Utah next to a big salty lake that smelled like sulfur. Now, most people in their right minds wouldn’t think of taking up residence down wind of what can only be described as a cesspool but we are talking about people who gave up everything to follow a religion some washed up hack of a writer created. Nobody in that wagon train was in his right mind. And if you ever visit Salt Lake City you might be inclined to agree that they still aren’t .

Of course, in defense of Mormons and Scientologists, is Christianity really that much different? Look at the brand of religion Mike Huckabee practices. This guy will look you straight in the eye and tell you that God created the world in seven days and it all took place about 6000 years ago. Archeological evidence that provides proof to the contrary is nothing but tricks buried in the ground by the devil. That’s why Huckabee won’t win the nomination. Most conservatives like a man who talks a good god but they don’t want somebody who actually believes that crap. McCain and Romney are a match made in heaven.

Of course Romney might want to stop pointing the moral finger at Democrats. We’ve had 8 years of Republican dominated leadership and I’m not sure the country is ready for more of that brand of morality. Is gay marriage still an issue? I find it hard to believe that gay marriage made Larry Craig feel the need to solicit a love connection in an airport men’s room. Ted Haggard didn’t smoke a blend of crystal meth and man meat because Ohio State University chose to extended healthcare benefits to homosexual partners. The ACLU didn’t force anybody to have sexual relations with congressional pages.

Romney’s preaching from a pulpit of moral piety but he’s standing and thin ice. The Republican Party seems to embrace a concept of strict social discretion but they don’t have a concept of personal morality. That’s really the underlying theme in spirituality. The Bible is not intended to be a blueprint of how to run a country but rather how one person should tend to his own affairs. And Republicans have proven that their notion of morality doesn’t work. Conservative leaders frothed at the mouth over Janet Jacksons nipple getting 0.27 seconds of air time during a Super Bowl halftime performance but when Mark Foley got caught dipping his wick in teenaged boys those same leaders conspired to sweep the mess under a rug.

Now one would not be out of line to dismiss the Republican Party as a band of hypocritical pederasts who seek to codify morality into enforceable legislation for the sole purpose of enhancing the sexual tension of their perverted indulgences but let's not go overboard and call them closet homosexuals. It’s wrong to categorize the acts of Mark Foley and Larry Craig as homosexual because the vast majority of homosexuals don’t go to such extremes. That’s more or less a Republican thing. They aren’t gay, they just enjoy kinky sexual encounters with other men, or boys. Sometimes sheep but in Rush Limbaugh’s case he thought that ewe had eaten his bottle of Oxy. Say, didn't he once have some pretty good ideas on how to deal with addicts?

That’s why McCain’s in the lead. In a world full of angry white men who can’t get enough penis McCain might be the one guy with clear vision. Even if he can’t decide what that vision is. Back in October of 2004 the man was practically endorsing John Kerry, then he did a complete 180 and threw his enthusiastic support behind George W. Bush. McCain even met with Jerry Falwell, a man he once called a divisive zealot, and kissed his wrinkled butt to pander to the wild-eyed, snake-handling Christians Karl Rove coaxed to the polls. It threw them off because the fundamentalists weren’t used to going to church on Tuesday...that’s wife beating day...but it worked and they kept things close enough for the rigged ballots in Florida and Ohio to do their thing.

McCain learned a lesson but maybe it came too late. He used to be a bulldog who grabbed hold of the important issues and wouldn’t let go until his party dealt with them. The guy had balls. Now they’re gone. And in a party so infatuated with male genitalia it really doesn’t come as a surprise.

Caucuses?

2008-01-10T13:12:00.000-08:00

Caucuses. That doesn't sound good. I think I've been hacking up a good bit of caucus lately. All I know about them is that they happen in Iowa and New Hampshire and they play a roll in who the next president will be. That's unsettling.

Most people have never been to Iowa and if they have their way it will stay that way. Those same people were probably quite surprised to realize that New Hampshire is still a state. I know I was. It's hard to pick two states more obscure than Iowa and New Hampshire which is probably why both states clamor for attention by holding early primaries. It's like gymnastics and track, people only care about them once every four years. And then interest is marginal at best. Now if Hillary would get on the balance beam and do a few splits....ew. Sorry, that was wrong. Let's see if Fred Thompson and Dennis Kucinich can get their wives to do some splits for us. That would be better. In fact, if Fred and Dennis were the candidates this summer Their wives might actually get into a good old fashioned cat fight. One of those sexy cat fights where they rip off each others clothes and end up making out. That would be awesome.

It's funny that a handful of marginally literate sod farmers and the six people who live in New Hampshire have so much clout in determining who will represent the major parties in the upcoming election. Not only do these states represent a fraction of the electoral votes necessary to win the White House, they harbor the strangest people. New Hampshire is notable for it's motto: Live Free or Die. Sadly, residents tend to die. Mostly because of Lyme disease as New Hampshire is infested with deer ticks. Surely that affects voting.

Don't confuse Lyme Disease with Key Lime Syndrome. Key Lime Syndrome is a disorder that compels people to drink frozen cocktails and wear ugly shorts. Lyme Disease is a horrible affliction that makes people forget how to enunciate the letter "r".

Corn is Iowa's state motto. Interestingly enough corn is also Iowa's state flower, state tree, and state bird. You might be think corn doesn't fly but if you happen to visit Iowa during tornado season (February through December) you'll be proven wrong. Iowa is known as the Hawkeye State but that's because of the dirty look they gave Nebraska when Nebraska copy righted the term corn husker. It's true.

These are states that simply don't matter. The US Government put a bunch of missile silos in Iowa so the Soviets would target most of their missiles there. They didn't care about Iowa then and still don't as many of the missiles hidden in Iowa have been left to deteriorate and ooze radioactive sludge into Iowa's water table. New Hampshire is even less important. The only reason it was created was to cut Maine off from the rest of the country. For Some reason people from Maine get lost in New Hampshire and can't get out. New Hampshire is like a geographical roach motel.

I've been to both states. New Hampshire is mercifully brief but Iowa is like a treadmill. It doesn't look that long but it takes about two day to drive through it. If not for the deer ticks New Hampshire might even be charming but take one step out of your car and you'll find your body covered in tiny bloodsuckers hell bent on boring into your vascular tissue and laying eggs in your brain. I don't like the idea that these people have an influence on who Florida and Ohio will foist on us.

Lead Story.

2007-11-12T17:41:00.000-08:00

I’ve grown a little weary with the tainted toy tales proliferating the news lately. Maybe unscrupulous manufacturers are cutting corners at the expense of our children, perhaps China is implementing a complex plan to achieve world domination, or maybe it’s just easy money for the pampered talking heads who call themselves news reporters. I don’t really care.

Lead paint is supposed to be bad. Apparently the consumption of lead can lead to mental defects but I don’t know if I buy the science behind that theory. Does lead cause cognitive problems or are the people inclined to eat lead a little slow in the first place? I was a kid once and of all the idiotic things I did munching the stray paint chip wasn’t one of them. I also don’t recall eating too many toys. Maybe spoiled rich kids have so many toys that they eat some out of boredom and extremely poor children eat them out of hunder but I was middle class. We had enough food but few toys. Even if we had enough toys to eat I don't think I would have. None of them seemed to appealing. My little brother also had a tendency to stick things up his butt so you really didn't know what you'd get. If it would fit in your mouth you could bet it would fit up his ass. Even without such a deterrent kids shouldn't eat toys. What kind of inbred little monsters are out there gobbling Thomas The Tank for breakfast?

The way I see it we should use lead paint more often. What sort of world are we creating for ourselves if we eliminate all of nature’s checks and balances? Idiots must die. It’s for the betterment of the species. Do we really want the sort of children who eat toys growing up to clog the gene pool with their moron mojo? I think not.

That is of course assuming that lead is bad in the first place. I think we need a better case study on this matter. Run down a list of the essential nutrients and you’ll find plenty of metals. Do you expect me to believe that Iron, copper, zinc and magnesium are essential nutrients but lead is bad? Please. I take chromium supplements but a little lead might turn my brain into mush? Get out of here. Sodium and magnesium are hazardous metals that will react dangerously with water and they're so good for me I take them in a multivitamin but lead, which has no reaction with water aside from sinking, is bad news. I think we might be giving lead a bad rap.

I’m not a scientist but I know enough about the process to understand they are often wrong. Sometimes a scientist becomes a slave to a hypothesis. They’ll see a fat man eating bacon and eggs and assume that bacon and eggs cause obesity but it’s not until they feed a fit and healthy man bacon and eggs that they realize obesity might be better attributed to cheeseburgers and candy bars. Could this be the reason we think lead is bad? Have scientists been depriving us of another essential nutrient just because a handful of inbred paint eaters scored poorly on an IQ test? Maybe.

They could be right, though. I know mercury is bad news in spite of the really cool name. When we were kids I was convinced that mercury was the key to attaining super speed much like that exhibited by the comic book hero The Flash. I carefully stole a bottle full of mercury from thermostat switches all over school and was prepared to drink it just before recess so I would gain super speed in time for our daily game of kickball. My best friend stole my bottle of mercury out of my book bag when I wasn’t looking and drank it before lunch. Nothing happened right away but over the next several weeks he turned a ghastly shade of pale and his hair fell out in clumps. The doctors managed to neutralize the mercury in his system but not before permanent damage was done. Now he works for the Bush administration as one of fifteen version of Dick Cheney. Interestingly enough all fifteen recruits were acquired through a medical records search for people who survived severe mercury poisoning. The real Dick Cheney is still alive but he has been hard wired into a defense computer at NORAD. My friend is the version who shot Harry Whittington but he did it under orders from Karl Rove because it was just the sort of thing the real Dick Cheney would do. It's a cool job but I don't know that looking like Dick Cheney is worth it.

Until we know more about lead and have some definitive proof that its bad I think we need to take a deep breath and relax. Is this really a problem? Do we have to send the global economy into a tail spin over this? I don’t think so. Tell your kids not to eat their toys. It’s that simple. If they listen you’ve got some bright kids with promising futures, if they don’t you get to purge the dead weight early and start fresh. It’s a win win situation. Now who wants to buy one of these bootlegged Thomas The Tank play sets?

Ohio Stripped of strippers

2007-10-25T08:34:00.001-07:00

I’ve never been a big fan of being told what to do. I was a rebellious child and a resentful student. The trend continues to this day. I’ve infuriated employers and coworkers alike. It’s not that I don’t like to follow rules; I’m a law-abiding citizen and for the most part I’m an honorable and respectful person. My problem is when authority is imposed for authority’s sake. Don’t push me around. My response to the cop who tells me to “move along” is usually “get a warrant”. If I’m feeling particularly salty I might even call him “bacon boy” or “dough nut breath”. Fuck the police indeed.

I wear my seatbelt because I don’t want to end up in a wheelchair if some idiot crosses the center line and hits me head on (apply directly to the forehead) but it pisses me off that there are laws that make choosing not to wear a seatbelt illegal. If I don’t want to wear my seatbelt it’s really nobody else’s business. Sure, it’s dangerous to drive with out it but I do lots of things that are dangerous. I sure don’t want somebody telling me I can’t ski because the risk for injury is too severe. Screw you.

I’m not a big fan of strip clubs. Part of that is because my wife is smoking hot and will strip for free but it’s mostly because I’m a pretty big fan of completing the transaction…if you know what I mean. What’s the point in watching attractive women dance around in the nude if you aren’t going to dance with them? So I don’t go, but that doesn’t mean I want some bible-thumping loon to tell me when I can and can’t see naked women.

Ohio recently imposed a rigid law governing the operation of strip clubs. Basically strip clubs can’t operate after midnight. If they do, the ladies need to put their clothes on and wait tables. That’s patently stupid. On the rare occasion I feel slightly inclined to go to a strip club it’s after midnight. I suspect that’s the case for most guys. That’s why those phone sex commercials proliferate basic cable in the wee hours of the morning. Shutting the clubs down only diverts that post-midnight money.

Another provision in that law makes it a crime if an erotic entertainer and a patron are closer than six feet to each other. That’s a sticky wicket because there are a lot of situations where a stripper and a patron could breach that arbitrary radius, such as ordering a drink or walking to the rest room. Strippers will be like black cats with patrons trying to jump out of that dreaded “six-foot radius”. And heaven help you if you bump into a stripper in one of those dark, cramped clubs. That could be a felony. It’s also odd because we don’t know the limits… where does it stop? One could argue that waitresses at Hooters are defacto erotic entertainers and they continuously breach that radius.

And you can bet the cops will enforce the law. Why? Easy duty and easy money. Cops will line up to get assigned to a stakeout and the fines will roll in so fast the courthouses will install credit card machines in every court room. Gone are the days when nabbing sex offenders required extensive sting operations. Cha-ching.

The “six-foot rule” also ends the lucrative enterprises of lap dances, table dances and the revered tradition of stuffing bills into g-strings. What now…a collection plate? Speaking of which, I’d probably go to church and contribute readily if they’d peddle some flesh other than that stale old cracker they pass off as “the body of Christ.” I’m sorry but I’d like my savior to be a little more savory…and I wouldn’t mind catching the occasional glimpse of Mary’s virgin hoo-hah. What’s she hiding anyway? See, already I’m feeling sexually repressed. I’m almost 40 which means there’s a 50/50 chance I’ll be fat, bald and single in a few years. Then I’ll need strip clubs.

I suppose I can hang around the Catholic high school. I noticed that they built an addition and strategically encased a stairwell in glass. That makes it easy to sit outside and look up those naughty little skirts as the girls migrate between classes. Since the new strip club laws have gone into effect I’ve noticed cars starting to line up outside. I wonder if that was part of the plan. Will the diocese put in meters so they can cash in on the newly created market?

The argument for the strip club law is that it will cut down on crime. One proponent actually argued that men will spend less time and money in the strip clubs thus making them better husbands and fathers. Really? Or will that derelict father turn to some other diversion? There are certainly things much worse than strip clubs. Prohibition taught us a valuable lesson: Depriving people of alcohol actually increased criminal activity and turned a nation into junkies willing to brew rot gut in their bathtubs and drink turpentine straight from the bottle.

It stands to reason that the men who found some degree of sexual gratification in the controlled environment of the strip club will resort to illicit forms of satisfaction. I suspect illegal prostitution will increase. After all, if you’re committing a crime by getting a lap dance you might as well go all the way and make it count. And why is prostitution illegal in the first place? Sex is usually a transaction anyway. Is there really that much of a difference between buying a woman a tennis bracelet and giving her cash?

Morality is a personal issue. If you don’t like strip clubs, don’t go. If the strip club near you is a den of criminal activity then demand that the police enforce existing laws, but don’t sterilize society because you have a problem with erotica. Laws should only be written to protect people from doing harm to one another. Strips clubs aren’t forcing themselves on anybody; everybody is there by choice. If we’re going to impose laws on people to protect them from their own choices we might want to consider banning cheeseburgers and candy bars.

Or church. I’ve seen more lives ruined by evangelists than by strippers.

Craig violated Man Laws

2007-10-18T08:26:00.001-07:00

I didn’t want to write about Larry Craig again but, like that creepy gay guy waiting for the GHB to knock his frat brother out, he just won’t go away. Sometimes a story won’t go away but in this case Larry Craig won’t. He plopped his tight little butt down on a couch conspicuously distanced from his wife and fielded prescreened softball questions from Today’s, Matt Lauer. Larry Craig certainly put on a better performance than Lauer, managing to emote a fair facsimile of consternation when Lauer sheepishly asked Craig if he was actually bisexual, but it was weak. Lauer asked the same questions Larry Craig has been answering for months. It was old news carefully reworked to give Craig an opportunity to show sincerity.

Where were the tough questions Matt? Did Katie Couric’s sickening levels of perkiness dull the sense of journalistic integrity you developed at Ohio University, or were you one of those guys who skipped classes in favor of the next party? Any guy who has used a public restroom knows Larry Craig is lying. He violated several important restroom codes…unwritten rules that preserve the integrity of the loo. Lauer should have confronted Craig on his violation of toilet etiquette. Even if Craig isn’t gay, the manner in which he flouted long standing policy in public restroom diplomacy is grounds to remove him from office.

Craig admitted that he peered through the gaps between the stall doors and the walls. The arresting officer claimed Craig was so close that one could determine the color of Craig’s eyes. Craig denies being excessively close to the stalls but he does admit that he peered through the gaps for “movement”.

This is unacceptable. Under no circumstances are people allowed to observe activity through the stalls. Generally a closed stall door is a sign that the stall is occupied and many stalls, particularly those in airports actually display an occupied tag when the latch is engaged. If the stall doors tend to rest in a closed position it is acceptable to glance under the door to look for feet but you never try to look through the stall at the person in side.

There are rare public restrooms that do not feature stall doors. My high school employed this measure to discourage smoking and/or monkey spanking. When a person was using the stall for those purposes for which these stalls are constructed visual contact was avoided. This is also true when men are using urinals…eyes front, fixed on a point well above the penis. Why do you think men have trouble aiming a device they’ve been handling since the womb? There is the Ray Busser exception. Ray is a guy I went to high school with who had enormous difficulty conducting bathroom business when people were looking at him. From 1986 through 1989 Ray ruptured his bladder four times because he simply couldn’t pee when people were watching him.

So Craig admits to violating an important rule in the restroom code of conduct. As a voter I can honestly tell you I would not be inclined to support him in future elections and I would expect the rest of the Senate to censure him at the very least.

Once Craig found a stall he claims that he assumed a wide stance while sitting on the toilet. A wide stance is fine for urination but when performing seated functions it is not practical. Some guys actually put their feet together and splay their knees, positioning their pants around the ankles. This makes it impossible to spread the feet apart without removing the pants. Most men prefer the “shoulder width” method which allows for optimal leverage while maintaining control over the pants. In all my years of utilizing public restrooms I have yet to see anybody assume a wide stance. Craig claims he’s a “wide guy”. I’m not sure what this means but when he makes this claim you can actually hear the quotation marks so I’m inclined to believe that this is some sort of innuendo.

Even if Craig is one of these rare people who finds the wide stance comfortable there are still rules that modify restroom behavior when neighboring stalls are occupied. In addition to the use of stealth modes (minimizing sounds) and courtesy flushes (minimizing stench), men honor a strict no touching policy. Hands are not shaken, shoulders are not squeezed and feet are not bumped in the restroom. That’s just the way it is.

Here’s the problem: Craig admits that he bumped feet with the cop. Granted he states that he thinks they bumped feet, but that’s a lie. You know when you bump feet and would be even more aware of it if it happened in a restroom. Even if he wasn’t soliciting sex this is still an arrest-worthy violation. It’s like running over an old lady in a cross walk; even if it’s an accident you have to pay the price. Matt Lauer should have gone on the attack right there. Have you ever bumped feet with somebody in a restroom before? Did that person punch you in the eye? What kind of a freak goes around bumping feet under stalls? Hard questions, Matt…you get paid to ask them.

Craig also admits that his hand might have breached the integrity of the neighboring stall. He claims he saw a piece of toilet paper on the floor and reached to pick it up. In the process his hand may or may not have passed under the divider. In the Lauer interview Craig explains that the toilet paper was on his shoe but when he was first questioned he stated it was on the floor. Clearly Craig read my last entry on how disgusting it is to be picking up stray pieces of paper on a public restroom floor and revised his statement. What he doesn’t understand is that it’s still not acceptable. If toilet paper is stuck to your shoe you try to rub it off on a rug or pull it off with your other foot. Nobody touches stray toilet paper. Craig would be better off claiming he was reaching for a stray twenty which is the smallest denomination a man of his income would pick up off a bathroom floor.

And no man in his right mind would risk breaching the other stall’s divider. You might as well shove your hand down another man’s pants and jiggle his goodies. Craig admits that it’s possible that the cop saw his hand on the cop’s side of the divider. Just creating that possibility is reprehensible. Keep your hands up.

Instead of tackling these issues and getting Craig to explain why a man of his age and pedigree would so wantonly violate basic restroom protocol is beyond me. I care less about Larry Craig being gay than I do about him refusing to honor essential man laws. Clearly, Matt Lauer is not a man…which might explain why Larry Craig didn’t play footsy with him during the interview.

Comma Ohio

2007-09-27T09:32:00.001-07:00

What’s in a name?

For people in Columbus, everything. Apparently people in this city are fed up with having to include Ohio in the answer to the question: where are you from? It doesn’t bother me, in fact I insist on offering up the state just so I don’t get mistaken for one of those tobacco chewing mutants from Georgia. Still most people don’t want to be troubled with including comma Ohio. It must be too much work.

To be fair, Ohio is a pretty clunky state to enunciate. It’s only got three different letters in it but somehow manages to demand three syllables. That’s just out of line, but Ohio is a high maintenance state. We don’t even have a flag like the rest of the states; instead we opt for a burgee. Most people don’t know what a burgee is which is understandable since nobody uses them. It’s like two pennants stitched together. Talk about overcompensating.

Columbus is like the youngest child in a big family with active siblings. The city is constantly taunting Cleveland and Cincinnati by claiming that it’s bigger, smarter and faster than they are. Still Cleveland and Cincinnati enjoy single name status which infuriates Columbus to no end. Even lowly Toledo is in the cool crowd thanks to Jamie Farr. Akron and Canton are prospective members of that club as well but Columbus is stuck wearing that cheesy name tag that reminds people that it’s in Ohio.

City leaders even waste time on this subject. Elected officials have spent money trying to elevate Columbus to that level of recognition that would make comma Ohio optional. The city has landed professional sports teams and adamantly refused to allow those teams to be called the Ohio (whatever). Since many of the cities rolling sans state have professional sports teams Columbus civic leaders believe that this is the answer.

They might be right but it has to be sports people actually care about. Major League Soccer and the NHL aren’t exactly mainstream enterprises and even if people did care the local team has to win. The Columbus Blue Jackets aren’t a force to be reckoned with.
And there’s a prime example of what makes Columbus such a forgettable place. What the hell is a Blue Jacket?

It’s not really a stupid name. Blue Jacket was a Shawnee warrior who fought against whites as they expanded into the Northwest Territory. Most people familiar with those early Indian wars think of Tecumseh who was more famous than his predecessor. Little is known about Blue Jacket but he was active in the area around Columbus. The problem is that team officials don’t claim Blue Jacket as the inspiration…even though the only reference to Blue Jacket in the area is an epic outdoor drama depicting the exploits of the war chief.

Instead of developing that angle and paying homage to Shawnee heritage, team officials adopted a blue bee named Stinger as their mascot and put a civil war era cap on his head. They claimed that Blue Jackets was a nickname given to union soldiers. So they combined the concept of a mutant hornet with a fictitious etymology. Translation: boring.

Columbus is a city replete with plenty of reasons to forget about Columbus. There’s an infamous field of concrete corn on the northwest side of town, the Major League Soccer team is dubbed The Crew, which is a reference to the extensive construction work taking place around the city when the team was created, and wedged in a mud bank in the Scioto River, downtown is a replica of the Santa Maria. A big 1400s era sea going vessel is moored in the middle of Ohio.

Why?

It’s true that Columbus, Ohio, like so many other places in North America, was named for the explorer/opium peddler/slave trader/blithering idiot but why would a city in the middle of Ohio see the need to purchase a replica of his flagship? It’s not as if Columbus ever sailed through the Gulf of Mexico, up the Mississippi and turned right on the Ohio only to find himself curious about where the Scioto might lead him. Columbus never set foot on the mainland and is believed to have died insisting that China was just a little bit past the little islands he "discovered". Erecting such a monument to his efforts might attract historians and tourists interested in viewing the place Columbus chose to drop anchor and then the city would enjoy that mono-moniker it craves if only Columbus hadn't been such a lazy explorer. I have lived in Columbus for years and still can’t figure out why we are supposed to be fascinated with Christopher. It’s coincidental, people, let’s move on.

But Columbus isn’t alone in inanity. Nearby Westerville’s claim to fame is its stoic commitment to prohibition. The former home of the Anti-saloon League remained dry for decades only relaxing its alcohol restrictions in recent years. Another suburb, Reynoldsburg, celebrates itself as the birthplace of the tomato. No kidding. There’s a tomato festival in Reynoldsburg every year but nobody in central Ohio seems to know why. A call to the city’s office reveals that it’s the birthplace of the commercial tomato but explanations are vague beyond that. Why make such a dubious claim? It’s not as if it draws tourists. For some reason central Ohio’s favorite pastime seems to be clamoring for attention.

Most of the cities we know of on a first name basis earned it the hard way. In the 1980s and early 90s Columbus was known as Cow Town because there were still pastures within the city limits and the annual state fair is held just a few miles from down town every year. Cow Town records and Cow Town guitars both closed up shop in the late 90s but when the NHL first came to Columbus in 2000 fans wanted the team to be named the Columbus Mad Cows. In fact a minor league hockey team took advantage of that popularity and played one game as the Columbus Mad Cows. The jerseys remain popular with collectors. City leaders took umbrage and made great efforts to distance themselves from that name. They believed it was detrimental to the city’s image and could cost billions of dollars.

What they did was miss a golden opportunity to join the single name club. Cleveland endured (and continues to endure) mean spirited jokes about its industrial past and current economic woes. Recently Cleveland was the butt of yet another joke by NBC’s 30 Rock where characters on the show expressed a satirical admiration for Cleveland as a vacation destination. Does Cleveland throw a tantrum and demand respect? Nope, the city rolls with the punches. Great Lakes Brewing Company even named its flagship beer after the infamous 1969 fire that set the Cuyahoga river ablaze. For the record, Burning River Pale Ale is a fabulous beer. It’s aggressively hopped without being woody and the complexities of the malt shine through with each sip.

Toledo might very well owe its popularity to Jamie Farr incessantly plugging his hometown as Max Klinger on MASH. The name also stands out thanks in no small part to the exclamation Holy Toledo but Toledo is known for its many obvious faults more than it is its charms. Nobody seems happy about going there. Name recognition isn’t always a good thing. There’s a fine line between fame and infamy. Look at Reno.

Anonymity isn’t a bad thing at all. Columbus is a great place to live, so what if you don’t want to visit? Now let's all go to Applebee's.

Finally! A presidential campaign we can be proud of.

2007-09-19T11:01:00.000-07:00

Our last two presidential elections lacked charisma. George W. Bush won because his party pandered to the Christian fundamentalists on the far fringes of the religious right. He surrounded himself with people who firmly believed that the greatest threat to our country was the enormous popularity of Harry Potter.

Everybody knows that Bush cheated in both elections…when Pat “Hitler” Buchanan gets enough votes to win counties with a heavy Jewish population you know that something is amiss…but he was only able to cheat because the Democrats failed to challenge him with a strong candidate. Al Gore was #4 in the Clinton Administration narrowly losing the number 3 spot out to whichever intern Clinton was banging that week but before that he took a back seat to his own wife, Tipper. To this day her stickers adorn almost everything at your local Media Play store, but her efforts to stamp out indecency were thwarted when Al invented the internet.

In an attempt to prove that Al Gore wasn’t quite as P-whipped as everybody made him out to be, the next Democratic Candidate was John Kerry who famously stuck his foot in his mouth and crapped all over his campaign by uttering the infamous quote “I voted for the war in Iraq, before I voted against it.” Kerry later went on to characterize the men and women serving in Iraq as uneducated. Only a nincompoop like Kerry could take military service commendations earned in combat and turn them into a liability. Kerry comes from a well-to-do family with political connections but he swooped in and married into the Heinz family fortune anyway. Not surprisingly it was Teresa Kerry who wasn’t afraid to speak her mind.

Bush was no winner either. As inane as Kerry can be Bush is worse. Kerry puts his foot in his mouth but Bush consistently talks out of his ass. He’s a blithering idiot surrounded by creepy overlords like Dick Cheney who will shoot you in the face for no apparent reason and then demand an apology from you. With Bush, we’re talking about a guy who sexually harassed a world leader on international television. If you think that’s overstating it find the highest ranking female executive in your company, sneak up behind her at the quarterly meeting and squeeze her shoulders in front of everybody. Good bye career.

Charisma won’t be a problem this time around. Both parties have fielded a pool of front runners that are certain to amaze, astound and titillate. The Republicans have lawyer-actor-senator Fred Thompson taking the helm. Fred’s never been linked to any serious scandals but his wife is a former stripper/escort who is young enough to get him arrested in some of the northern states where the age of consent is a ridiculously elderly 16. If you thought Billy Carter, Roger Clinton and Neil Bush were campaign poison, wait until the Democrats start digging up dirt on the lovely Mrs. Thompson. Assuming, of course, that Fred passes conservative muster...there is reason for some to believe that Fred Thompson might have caught himself of case of the liberalism when he rubbed elbows with those bleeding heart Hollywood pinkos…like Sam Watterson.

If Fred falters Rudy Giuliani is likely to assume the nomination because he’s the only person still playing the 9-11 card who hasn’t been linked to a subsequent 9-11 scandal. Yet. There are those who take umbrage to the fact the Giuliani never made a visit to Ground Zero without his trusted media entourage but it’s nothing a photo montage and a little flag waving can’t cure. Yeah, Rudy exploited 9-11 for his own personal gain but he spent more time at Ground Zero than all of those stupid rescue workers who are whining about their health all of sudden. Those guys might have been crawling through the wreckage looking for bodies but Rudy could have been blinded by a flash bulb. Think of his retinas.

Giuliani has skeletons in his closet too and not just dead ex-wives he abandoned at their death beds. America’s Mayor grew up with mafia bosses. He played informants and hitmen with them. This is a biographical point Giuliani gleefully pointed out when he ran for mayor of New York City, but will the rest of the country feel good about electing a guy who made his fun money running numbers for the Gambino family? Overt mafia ties might work in New York and Chicago but the rest of the country prefers its politicians laundered.

Giuliani’s claim to fame is cleaning up New York but at what cost? Under Giuliani the NYPD ran amuck, shooting first and covering up the evidence later and while New Jersey is certainly a convenient place to dump the garbage when you run New York, we’ll need a president who is a little more creative. We can’t round up all of the drug dealers, bums and people who like to go out and ship them off to Canada. Or can we?

The biggest concern for the Republican Party is how to handle the campaign trail with all of the hot gay hook up spots being under surveillance. It was great when these sting operations were landing the limousine liberals in Hollywood but now all of that morality based funding has come back to haunt the moral majority. Can the Republican front runners keep their hands of other men long enough to win the election? How long can you go without hot gay sex?

The Democrats aren’t exactly rolling out a second string either. Hillary Clinton is the Imelda Marcos of skeleton closets. Hillary’s got scandals warehoused in locations around the country. The problem is that the Republican party spent millions of dollars digging up every last bone but couldn’t find the connective tissue to make anything stick to Hillary or her husband. Pundits like Limbaugh, Beck and Coulter will make all kinds of grand accusations but the only people buying them will be die hard Republican ditto heads. It will make for great entertainment but it won’t hurt her. They’d be better off proving that she’s a lesbian and when you look at Bill’s taste in mistresses that might not be far from the truth.

Barak Obama is the most intriguing candidate of this election. He criticized the entire baby boomer generation on record and his middle name is Hussein. Wrap your mind around that for a while. Barak Hussein Obama. In name alone he is already the greatest president this country has ever had. All of this country’s problems with the Middle East would melt away the day he wins the election because nobody in that corner of the world is going to mess with somebody named Barak Hussein Obama. In the various Islamic languages his name literally translates to Make My Day. To those people it might as well be Ivan The Terrible, Genghis Kahn or Pope Benedict.

Obama doesn’t have a long political career so it’s hard to tie him to any scandals but in addition to the name, Obama has familial ties to Islam. It’s even been rumored that he attended an Islamic elementary school in the Philippines where, according to conservative pundits, he may or may not have studied the mystical art of suicide bombing. Apparently he didn’t receiving a passing grade, but that doesn’t mean he won’t take it up as a hobby while in office. That should provide plenty of fodder once the campaign battles start heating up. Not that they’ll need it because Obama is black, after all. The day this country elects a black president is the day all the white people pack up and move to Canada.

Come to think of it, that might not be so bad.

Touching the Bases.

2007-09-10T09:57:00.000-07:00

The reporters made him do it.

Larry Craig claims he’s not gay. All he wanted was a little guy on guy action in the men’s room and the next thing he knew he was being arrested. Granted, when the undercover cop first shoved him up against the wall and started frisking him Craig was excited but when he was marched out to the awaiting cruiser the gig was up.

Craig made the mistake of looking for love in the wrong place. Guys on the down low, as they call it, have to stay ahead of the cops. The airport restroom Craig tried to hook up in was an old hot spot that the cops were all too aware of. All it takes is one straight guy walking in on a casual daisy chain to bring the weight of the police department down on the whole operation. If Larry Craig had checked the chat rooms rather than taking Ted Stevens at his word, Craig would have known he was reaching under the wrong stall.

Craig won’t admit that he was on a sausage hunt in that crapper but he accepted a plea agreement. Now he claims that he copped the plea in order to get those pesky reporters off his back and believes that is sufficient grounds to revoke his guilty plea. It might work but does he really think he’ll get his credibility back?

http://www.azcentral.com/offbeat/articles/0909saltyburger-ON.html

In Georgia a McDonald’s employee was arrested and detained for over-salting a burger. She might face criminal charges. Of course the “victim” was a police officer who claims that the salty burger made him sick which prompted the accused to ask why he ate the burger rather than spit it out and demand a refund. Indeed.

This is a classic example of cops abusing their power and the criminal justice system playing along. It’s hard enough to get a cop to show up when there’s trouble but could you imagine an arrest being made if Joe Cubicle filed a police report over an over-seasoned chicken sandwich?

Then the FOP wants to pester people for donations over the phone. Why? So abusive cops can opt out of a private supplemental life insurance policy and let the FOP pick up the slack? No thanks, porky. We’ll start looking out for cops when they start looking out for us. Oink.

http://tv.msn.com/tv/article.aspx?news=274940&GT1=7703

Unlike the Academy Awards, MTV doesn’t mind if the Video Music Awards turn out to be a train wreck. They count on something going awry because that makes for good television. So if Andy Dick pees on Vanessa Carlton and Madonna French kisses Paris Hilton’s dog du jour, they’ll have plenty of fodder for future programming that does not feature videos. In fact, given the reality-based edge to their programming it’s quite possible that the “M” in MTV stands for Moronic. They don’t care, as long as we keep tuning in. And that’s why the VMAs have to be a disaster.

It was a great year. Britney Spears made a name for herself by having what might have been the greatest body of all time. She had no vocal talent, limited intellectual skills and her dancing wasn’t anything more than a vehicle to make sure he body was writhing in all the right places but she was just a body. Her face wasn’t even that spectacular upon further review. Well Britney proved that there might have been just a smidgeon of talent there early in her career because her performance was awful. She can’t even lip sync anymore and while her body is still better than what you’ll see on most public beaches, it’s far from the Barbie with a pulse vessel she once had. The reports about Brit being grossly out of shape are exaggerated but she has no business getting paid to prance around nearly naked anymore.

Kid Rock decked Tommy Lee. It might have been over Pam Anderson but more likely it was over a bag a weed. In case you though both of them were washed up, security opted to drag Tommy Lee out in a head lock while Kid Rock got to stay. Clearly he’s got a few minutes of fame left but look out Kid, next year Jason Mraz might bitch slap you and you’ll be the one hauled out kicking and screaming.

Of course that prompted plenty of wisecracks from people like Jamie Foxx who quipped something about ending white on white crime. Apparently Jamie was only funny when the Wayans brothers were writing his jokes. It’s not funny. What black people need to realize is that there’s a difference between white people and crackers. Every time white people get together to have a good time, crackers be fucking it up for everybody. You go to the VMAs and crackers be beating each other up in the back over some white trash tramp with a case of hepatitis and a crotch full of crabs. Guys, chill out. There’s room enough for two...and you both know it.

But the star of the show was Kanye West who threw a world class tantrum (again) over not winning any awards. Kanye is clearly the best person in the history of the world ever. He’s bigger than Elvis, The Beatles and Run DMC. Before him there was nothing and after him the world will be a better place. But only if he wins an award, otherwise he’ll punish us with his wrath. Kanye’s a decent rapper but when you get right to it, he’s really a one hit wonder. Gold Digger was a great track but the star of that show was Jamie Fox who performed a spot on impersonation of Ray Charles singing a new version of “I Got a Woman”. Without that pseudo sample Gold Digger wouldn’t have soared to the top of the charts. So that wasn’t Kanye’s song.

Kanye will tell you that Jesus Walk and Touch the Sky were huge hits but they weren’t that big. He’s scored some success and believes that he’s special because he doesn’t rap about drugs and violence but his music is still indulgent. The Fat Boys didn’t rap about drugs and violence either, neither did Kris Kross. Jesus Walk and Touch the Sky are both odes to Kanye’s massive ego. He thinks he is Jesus but Jesus didn’t throw tantrums over not winning awards. Kanye will just have to wait for Rick Ruben to remake his career.

We'll have a gay old time!

2007-09-04T12:14:00.000-07:00

Gay-dar. Be it a keen sense or a breakthrough device man has been preoccupied with detecting sexual orientation. Until now there has never been a proven method for detecting homosexuality in men (when it comes to women we have the WNBA). Now the answer is clear: political party. Based on irrefutable evidence and countless studies it’s clear that Republicans are gay. It’s not mutually exclusive, however. While all Republicans are clearly gay, all gays are not Republican.

Larry Craig is the latest conservative queen to be identified. He got caught trying to put the “lay” in layover in a Minneapolis rest room. He copped a plea after trying to cop a feel from an undercover airport police officer. Of course when the story began circulating he denied it, insisted he was framed in a sting operation and called the arresting officer a liar but when the tapes of his interview with that officer became public Craig seemed to be the one struggling with the truth. Now he’s imposed upon his family and they are defending his sexual orientation.

Craig doesn’t deny making contact with the officer in the other stall. He admits that he might have bumped the officer’s foot.When accused of reaching his hand under the stall to gesture for sexual contact, Craig insists he was trying to pick up a stray piece of toilet paper off of the floor. None of it adds up. First of all, compromising the integrity of the stall and making contact with another man is grounds for a world class beating. There’s no oops in the men’s room. Not even when urine misses the mark. Talking is prohibited unless both men are at the sink washing their hands…which never happens because men don’t wash their hands unless their mothers are watching them. Secondly, nobody picks up toilet paper off the rest room floor. Not even the custodial staff. It’s too risky. That toilet paper could have any number of nasty things on it and even if it doesn’t the floor probably does. So every man in the world knows that Craig is a liar.

This comes on the heels of former McCain campaigner and Florida state representative Bob Allen getting arrested in a public restroom for soliciting sex from an undercover office. Again, a male undercover officer. Allen’s excuse was that he was afraid of black people so he figured offering a big black man 20 bucks and a blow job would save him from something worse but if you happen to be straight there really isn’t anything worse. Being forced to perform fellatio on another man is bad enough but losing 20 bucks in the process is just unacceptable. No way was he being honest.

Just before the November 2006 election the Mark Foley scandal broke. Foley was a conservative lynch pin who got caught carrying on a graphic sexual relationship with a teenaged congressional page. Foley blamed booze for his lapse in morals. It’s true that alcohol does impair judgment but it does not change sexual orientation. Nobody was really surprised by Foley’s affair with a nubile page, however, the outrage was over the Republican party trying to sweep that story under the rug and leave Foley on a committee dealing with the sexual abuse of minors.

Of course the homosexual high jinks aren’t limited to elected officials. Conservative Christian leader Tim Haggard stepped down from his pulpit when news of his ongoing sexual relationship with a male prostitute surfaced and there is a list of Republican staffers who are gay making the rounds. And lest we forget, conservative news skank, Jim Guckert owned and operated a gay escort service on the internet while working in the White House press corps. At least he advertised himself as a top, no self respecting conservative would ever choose to be a catcher. He despises gays but for a fee he’ll deliver a night of homoerotic pleasure you won’t soon forget.

Conservative pundits are clearly gay as well. We all know Ann Coulter is a man in drag. It’s the Adam’s apple, stupid. What wayward fraternity brother or horny PFC on leave hasn’t learned that lesson the hard way? The difference is that straight men don’t go back for more. Republicans do. Glenn Beck does. He also shops at pottery barn and adores scented candles. And while Rush Limbaugh hasn’t been taken to task on his boy toy at home, we all know it’s only a matter of time before we see a You Tube video of that beefy blowhard on his hands and knees reenacting Ned Beatty’s infamous scene from Deliverance. Wheee! Wheee! Wheee!

Poking fun by calling it the Gay Old Party isn’t fair. Republicans are deeper than that. It’s a big tent, filled with all kinds of kinky gay sex that would make the Village People blush. Republicans like it dirty and it’s so much more exciting when its taboo. Besides, there are plenty of respectable gay people out there who don’t deserve to be lumped in with these conservative freaks.

Republicans engage in the nasty fetish-oriented side of homosexuality. That’s why they legislate against it. Increasing the risk enhances the pleasure. The age old adage in Washington is that only two things can kill a political career. Teddy Kennedy proved to be the exception to the dead girl theory, now Republicans are racing to see who can overcome the albatross of a live boy. Somebody’s got to beat it, right? And the one who does will be a heavy hitter in conservative politics for decades to come.

However, Republicans are only human. We all have a tendency to overindulge and that’s why it seems that every day another Republican stalwart is caught up in another gay scandal. Nobody in the GOP wants to stand up and forcefully denounce the depravity because everybody’s doing it. Ask not for whom the bell tolls or in this case, for whom the chimes tinkle.

Getting the most out of celebrity gossip

2007-08-27T12:10:00.000-07:00

It’s occurred to me that tabloid shows would be a lot more interesting if they actually emulated tabloids. Sadly this came to me recently when I was watching one of celebrity gossip gabfests one evening. I don’t know the names of the shows but it was not the show with Sugar Ray. Yes, I know his name is Mark McGrath but if people are going to insist on calling Darius Rucker “Hootie” I think it’s only fair if we call Mark McGrath “Sugar Ray”, which makes me wonder if these tabloid shows would fare better if “Hootie” was a host.

It’s important to clarify that I didn’t seek this show out. It happened to be on when I sat down and I did not feel inclined to change the channel. I’m not being coy when I say that I didn’t enjoy the program. It was awful. Believe me, I wish I was just saying that. I prefer to get my dirt from Best Week Ever because I like my gossip delivered with the snarky commentary that only has-been and never-will-be comics can deliver. Go get ‘em, Doug Benson.

The host (I later learned his name is Billy Bush) makes Ryan Seacrest seem like a man’s man. Billy Bush is an annoying little turd who seems more interested in his time in front of the camera than the people he’s supposed to be yammering on about. Granted that’s not unusual in his line of work. Katie Couric ditched a cushy gig on NBC so she could get more exposure on CBS. Well, she doesn’t get more exposure because Today ran for 10 hours straight but CBS guarantees plenty of shots at he legs and a special make up crew to keep those gams in prime condition. The problem with Billy is that he’s so obvious about being a whore. Billy Bush is like that hooker down in the warehouse district where as Katie’s more like a $2500 a night call girl, although at this point CBS is probably wishing they would have gone that route. The $2500 a night call girl would be cheaper and more believable.

One of the (ahem) news items was a quick blurb on Britney’s hair. Apparently it’s grown a full two inches since she hacked it off to get even with her evil mother. All it did was made it easier for her mom to steal her boyfriends. There was another segment on Nicole Ritchie and her official California department of corrections weight which seems to indicate a net gain of 20 pounds since Nicole was last arrested. Something tells me that extra 20 pounds was probably contraband stuffed deep into various orifices.

Now I’m sure that these shows are more interesting when Lindsay Lohan runs over a girl scout troop and with Halloween coming up around the time she gets out of rehab for real there’s still hope, but the content on these shows leaves something to be desired. When I see the tabloid magazines in the checkout isle I notice compelling stories about women giving birth half human freaks and alien conspiracies. Even the more mundane celebrity gab rags deliver interesting pictures of Sharon Stone’s flabby ass and Jessica Alba’s botched Brazilian. Why can’t they feature those stories on the live action shows?

I’d also like to see some hard hitting stuff. Paper tabloids love to speculate about sexuality, so let’s put some of these celebrities on the hot seat and get to the point. I’m tired of wondering about Nathan Lane. Come on, buddy, fess up. Granted stars like Nathan Lane don’t want to come out because the mystery keeps their names in the papers but why should they manipulate the press? This is still journalism, right? If these stars want to play they have to pay. Straight answers or no more publicity…not even if your publicist begs for it.

Imagine putting Tom Cruise to the test:

Gossip Monger: So, Tom, have you stopped being gay?

Tom Cruise: Yes…I mean no…wait, I’m not gay.

GM: It’s a yes or no question.

TC: No it’s not! You…

GM: OK, No it is. So is Katie comfortable with your relationship?

TC: You’re a jerk.

GM: So she’s not. So are you seeing any famous men?

History in the Making

2007-07-31T11:50:00.000-07:00

The Bush Administration is surreal. We’ve seen audacity before: Bill Clinton actually requested clarification on the legal definition of the word “is”. George H.W. Bush barfed on the Emperor of Japan. Ronald Reagan made “I don’t recall” his presidential motto. If he becomes a permanent fixture on the dime they should replace “In God We Trust” with “I Don’t Recall”.

It doesn’t stop there. Gerald Ford was clearly appointed to pardon Richard Nixon who ordered federal agents to steal documents from the Democratic opposition. One can only imagine that he was talked down from ordering the assassination of the leading Democratic candidates and settled on theft as part of a compromise.

Presidents and the people around them have proven to be corrupt and inept often at the same time. This dereliction of duty started with John Adams when he forced the passage of the Alien and Sedition acts in order to quash criticism of his administration. Interestingly enough the Bush administration has tried to use its power to limit the scope of the press.

Nothing compares to the Bush administration and we’ve had some doozies. Bush has taken the worst we have seen out of our past presidents and gone one better. The good news is that it’s hard to imagine it will ever get worse. The bad news is that this guy managed to get two terms. Sure, both elections remain steeped in controversy with final counts in pivotal states still in question but how did it get close enough to steal?

You can run down the list of cabinet officials, review a biography of Karl Rove and analyze the policy positions taken over the course of the past 7 years but nothing tops the two men at the top. Bush is the ever-bumbling moron to the embodiment of comic book evil that is Dick Cheney. It’s almost like a live action version of Pinky and The Brain.

Almost because The Brain was a cerebral intellectual genius who was often undermined by his control group counterpart where as Cheney is more of a surly old bastard who uses his bumbling sidekick as cover. You get the impression that when these guys leave office newly appointed White House officials will discover a shit stain on the Constitution from where Cheney literally wiped as ass on it and the Declaration of Independence will have splotches of Kool Aide on it because Bush used it as a coaster. We’ll probably find Lady Justice in a Supreme Court cloak room bound, gagged and sodomized with her scales and the Statue of Liberty might very well end up turning tricks in a Beijing massage parlor.

Unlike the quintessential bad guy, Cheney has no class. He dropped the F-bomb in Congress. Granted, we’d all like to (WTF is going on in here?) but Cheney used it in a threatening manner when addressing a rival. It should have been shocking but it wasn’t. We’re talking about a guy who shot a man in the face and then sat on his ass while that same man apologized to Dick Cheney for the public humiliation the shooting caused. Cheney is a heartless son of a bitch. Literally! The Federal government has spent almost as much money on Cheney’s ticker as it has on body armor for the troops. Cheney makes Emperor Palpatine from Star Wars seem like a fair and decent human being.

I’m still trying to figure out if W hails from the prominent political Bush family of Maine, Texas and Ohio or if he is actually related to the Bush’s Baked Beans clan. His father wasn’t exactly a great president nor was he an eloquent statesman but George H. W. Bush didn’t come across as patently stupid or even arrogant. The younger Bush is a dangerous combination of both. He’s definitely the product of several generations of wealth and the inevitable inbreeding that occurs when opulent people marry to consolidate power.

We’ve had presidents who managed to cast poor public images in the past. Jefferson was a poor public speaker who mumbled in hopes of hiding a lisp. Carter seemed wimpy, as did the elder Bush and Richard Nixon was just creepy. Gerald Ford was widely regarded as somewhat dumb but that was because he was a very slow, deliberate speaker. When it comes to speaking it’s hard to think of a politician who hasn’t put his or her foot into his or her mouth. And when it comes to lies, boy do we have a surplus. Ronald Reagan was about as dishonest a president as you can find but he had so much charisma that there are people who actually want to put his face on Mount Rushmore.

Nobody beats Bush. Most people carefully craft their lies but Bush just fires away. He’s like that neighborhood brat you could catch red-handed throwing rocks through your garage windows only to deny it to the bitter end. Bush characterized John Kerry as a flip-flopper but it’s not hard for the producers of the Daily Show to compile a video segment of Bush contradicting himself. In fact the only time Bush seems capable of speaking with out stumbling over his tongue and creating new words is when he’s telling lies. It’s the truth that comes out in slow, garbled phrases that don’t quite make sense.

Thomas Jefferson was known to show disdain for pretense and offended many white house guest by suspending accepted social decorum for a more relaxed environment. Seating during White House dinners was based on who got there first and many dignitaries took offense that their fashionably late arrival resulted in a less desirable seat. This was a shrewd ploy by Jefferson to demonstrate that the American concept of power was different and respect was granted on an individual level, not necessarily by station alone.

Bush demonstrates a lack of decorum as well but his goes beyond the symbolic displays practiced by Jefferson and into the realm of boorish self-importance. From sexually harassing the Chancellor of Germany to shouting “Yo, Blair” across a room filled with foreign leaders, Bush has proven that he simply lacks respect for everybody that is not George W. Bush. He’s the “war president”; he is the “decider”; he doesn’t have to engage in tings as bothersome as diplomacy.

Other presidents went to great lengths to show world leaders respect. When John Kennedy faced the irascible Khrushchev he did it with a sense of poise and rationality that won him the respect of every other leader in the world. Imagine what life would be like had Kennedy possessed Bush’s sense of self-righteousness.
Long ago Bush decided to abandon his ivy league roots and embrace life as a redneck. He is a combination of Elmer Fudd and Yosemite Sam. He makes ridiculous accusations, outlandish threats and then has the nerve to blame liberals for the mess he made and Cheney comes out of his casket every so often to keep the train on the wrong track. It would be hilarious if it wasn’t real.

i-phone? YAWN!!!!

2007-07-12T11:33:00.001-07:00

The i-phone has hit the market. I can’t say I’m excited or surprised by this development. To be completely honest I’m always a little under-whelmed with the latest toys.

I was born in 1970. That makes me 37 this year. It also makes me a Generation X’er. In case you missed the 80’s, we’re the tiny post-baby boom generation that lacks the motivation to sustain its own existence. We invented the six year method for obtaining a four year degree. And that’s only if it’s a useless degree. To actually obtain a degree with purpose we require an additional four years of undergraduate study. That’s after moving back home with mom and dad. Understanding my lack of enthusiasm for the i-phone requires an examination of what makes Generation X choose not to tick.

My parents and my grandparents were enamored with THE YEAR 2000. It was a mythical milestone so revered that it was always referred to as THE YEAR 2000. I was constantly regaled with their theories on what would happen. Nobody dared dismiss it with a cheeky designation such as Y2K or the familiar “two-thousand”. It was always referred to in bold face all caps format even though such type-face concepts weren’t familiar to people foolhardy enough to ensconce themselves in polyester suits before dancing the night away. To disco. Yeah, my dad claims he grew up before disco but he owned a leisure suit and a really tacky shirt. He still digs the Bee Gees. And he says rap is crap. Shall we review his record catalogue?

Generation X grew up with mixed messages. Our grandparents were certain that the world was going to end. 2000. Zero, zero. Party over, oops, out of time. Even Prince, a surprisingly influential voice of the time, seemed sure that 1999 was the last chance to lay it on the line. It was grim. My grades suffered because I realized the utter futility of school. Why bother getting an education when I was going to die before I could enjoy it? It made sense to pursue a lifestyle of hedonism early on. If only I had known then what hedonism entailed. I might have hit the road looking for “Darling Nikki”.

Of course our parents were less fatalistic. It’s hard to accept the notion that your children won’t be around long enough to squeeze off a grandchild or two (after that the original kids are expendable) so mom and dad opted to cling to the more positive aspects of THE YEAR 2000. Sadly this was based on images of cheesy post WW2 science fiction so that year represented the full fruition of every futuristic concept. For some reason, all baby boomers seemed to envision the future as a live action version of the Jetsons even though that cartoon was a cunning satire depicting a future where nothing important really changes. Sure you have a flying car and a robot maid but you still have a jerk for a boss and your hot wife has way too much time on her hands. You can bet Mrs. Jetson was getting her swerve on while George was at work getting his nuts handed to him by Spacely. Wilma cheated on Fred (possibly with Betty) and Blondie was definitely stepping out on Dagwood, the daughter is proof of that.

The point is that you should never marry somebody hotter than you deserve…no wait… it’s that our parents had a pretty silly perception of the future. By their logic we went from the Wright brothers crashing a glorified kite to jets in 50 years so having hover cars and teleporters in another 50 was reasonable. Man set foot on the moon in 1969…it all made sense. Hover cars for everyone.

So I grew up not knowing whether THE YEAR 2000 would bring instant death or hover cars, but it was going to be one of them. I never imagined that I’d be expected to get giddy over a phone that plays music. I thought that was what touchtone phones did. I really wanted the hover car but at that point my grandparents certainly seemed smarter than my Barry Manilow-loving parents (dad still raves about his talent and depth) so I banked on death, holding out hope that I would wake up on January 1st, THE YEAR 2000 to find a hover car parked outside waiting for me. Being the future, purchasing such a device would be unnecessary as the government would have no need for money. The Morlocks would do the dirty work and I would just have to avoid being eaten by them.

Imagine my disappointment. Sure, I’m alive but who wants to live in a world where cars still require contact with the road? That’s so 1910. I want my hover car and I want it now. Undoubtedly, a phone that takes pictures, plays music and surfs the internet is a dandy device but can you ride it? Hardly. Do you really think that you can placate an entire generation with a phone when we figured medical science would have unlocked our latent telepathic powers by now? We weren’t supposed to need phones after THE YEAR 2000. Just hover cars. And robot maids.

Real Issues

2007-05-04T09:49:00.000-07:00

I don’t mind when people feel inclined to say bless you in response to a sneeze. We’ve been programmed to believe that it’s an act of common courtesy but there is no moral or ethical basis for it. I do mind that people expect me to thank them for the blessing or insist that I should offer one in return.

A sneeze is an involuntary act: a reflex where the body attempts to clear the nasal passages of a foreign object. We associate sneezes with illnesses and allergies but in most cases the sneeze is triggered by harmless particulates. So the generally accepted idea that a blessing is offered in the hopes of good health is based on faulty logic since a good sneeze is often a sign of excellent health and a functional immune system. Those sneezes generated as the symptom of a cold should be regarded with disdain as those inclined to offer a blessing are probably being invaded by the same virus that caused the sneeze in the first place. Bless yourself…you’ll need it.

There are all sorts of ridiculous tales about sneezes. One modern myth is that the heart stops beating during the sneeze. In reality the heart beats just a little faster because the sneeze requires a considerable amount of energy. Older legends speak of spirits and souls. It was once believed that a person’s soul momentarily left the body after a sneeze and a timely blessing would prevent evil spirits from exploiting the vacancy.

A cough is also an involuntary action and a much better indicator of compromised health but we aren’t inclined to offer any sort of blessing or well wish when people cough. In fact we take umbrage when subjected to the sounds of another hacking away. We associate coughs with the spread of disease even though a sneeze propels more microbes over greater distances than a cough. Particles expelled in a sneeze can travel at speeds exceeding 200 miles per hour and the violent act of the sneeze includes the entire respiratory system. One can capture most of the expectorant during a cough but a sneeze is impossible to contain.

A burp is also involuntary and while it is generally associated with the ingestion of air burps can often be linked to serious health concerns, some of them far more serious than anything associated with a sneeze. Still, burps are not blessed. Burps are considered to be exceedingly rude. One who burps is required to apologize immediately and might possibly be subjected to ridicule.

Then of course you have the wayward fart. While the burp is readily excused when the offender expresses genuine contrition, a fart is intolerable. Even if the farter requests respite from those present there is still lingering consternation. Granted, a fart is often accompanied by a disagreeable if not offensive odor but in most cases the farter had no practical recourse. Farts can sometimes be held and released in private but they have been known to slip. Ironically farts tend to be noisiest when there has been an attempt to suppress them for a delayed release. As for suppression, sneezes can be restrained with some success as well but nobody is inclined to do it. Why sneeze in private when you can sneeze in public and be blessed? Sneezes put the obligation of courtesy on those who witnessed the sneeze while the fart places that burden on the afflicted party. It’s not fair.

Sneezes are more annoying. Everybody has a different sneeze ranging from a pretentious “choo” from the dainty princesses to a blood curdling...

“WAHHHHHCHHHAAAHAAAA!!”

...from macho men who have no sense of decorum. Some people add an affectation to the sneeze to make it more personalized while others will provide some commentary on the sneeze. The worst is when the person will try to explain the origin of the sneeze. I really don’t care about nasal polyps or nostril hair. Just sneeze and shut up.

An interesting dilemma is the combination sneeze. A sneeze is so forceful that the entire body must be solicited to execute it. As the abdominal muscles tighten excess air in the gastrointestinal tract is squeezed to the nearest exit. It is not uncommon for a person who sneezes to belch or fart simultaneously. Farts are more common because the sneeze utilizes the throat and mouth. Could you imagine if we exploited the other end of our digestive tract for respiration? Yuck. And what would we get down the wrong pipe in that case? EWWW! Generally the flatus is cranked out with such force it is quite audible. This might be the reason for excessive volume or superfluous noises after the sneeze. Occasionally the sneeze doesn’t mask the sound of the fart and sneezes never hide the smell, although sneeze induced farts rarely have detectable aroma as they are a product of abdominal compression and not a biochemical event.

Can a person be blessed and excused at the same time? Doesn’t that just cancel everything out? Why bother? It’s time to stop discriminating. Why should one bodily function be treated differently than the next? Haven’t we learned anything?

A person should not be subjected to judgment and ridicule because last night’s cabbage is waging war with intestinal enzymes. A corporate meeting should not be derailed because a sip of Mountain Dew wouldn’t go down without having the last word. More importantly, people who spray everybody within a 3 yard radius with droplets of spit and mucus propelled at lethal velocities should never be put on a pedestal. What's worse: smelling recycled White Castle for a few minutes or walking around with a thin veneer of somebody else's snot on your face?

I have a dream. I dream of a world where people ask to be excused for avoidable transgressions, not involuntary bodily functions. I dream of a world where a person suffering from IBS can still be taken seriously and continue his marketing presentation. I dream of a place where discomfort is judged not by the location of the symptoms but the severity of the vector. I dream that one day a man can break wind and say:

I have gas, I have gas; praise god almighty I have some gas.

Extra, Extra...

2007-04-30T08:31:00.000-07:00

Bad Boy Baldwin Bawls out Boorish Brat.

The world was stunned when Alec Baldwin’s voice mail tirade denouncing his daughter as a rude little pig hit the web. Gossip mongers were quick to jump into the fray. That’s to be expected, but so did some of the main stream news shows. A lot of time, money and energy went into figuring out what it all means.

Granted, Baldwin’s rant is something you’d expect out of the aging actor if he was given a bad seat at Spago or if some sycophant handed him a bottle of Aquafina instead of Dasani. It wasn’t appropriate for dealing with an insolent child but it wasn’t exactly something the world needs to worry about. I’ve personally endured much worse from my own parents and I’ve seen others get worse than that. I never had to retrieve such a scathing voicemail message on my Razor, but when I was 11 we didn’t have cellular phones so I got to enjoy the live performance. I have to tell you that nothing drives home an abusive message like errant spittle flying from the mouth of an angry parent.

We don’t have the whole story. We think that Alec Baldwin is an abusive husband but that’s only because his manic depressive ex-wife tells us he is. Kim Bassinger has squandered her mega-stardom telling everybody why they should feel sorry for her. Mommy was mean, kids made fun of her big lips and she hates all of the attention. After Alec left she told the world about his dark side. He used her insecurities against her. She never had a problem getting paid to be in movies and seemed quite content to let everybody enjoy her feminine perfection but on a deeper level she was a victim. Maybe Kim drove Alec crazy with her psychotic behavior. Of course nobody really cares about Kim any more. Everybody knows she’s a loon. The world is worried about the child. Alec went off on a 12 year-old girl. He’s a monster.

Really? Think about your average 12 year-old. They’re monsters. It’s a miracle so many kids make it out of puberty alive. In nature adolescents are part of the food chain for this very reason. Alec Baldwin’s daughter is at the age when parents become shrill caricatures of themselves because their children make them that way. Given the fact that we’re talking about a child who is probably more than a little spoiled it’s not hard to imagine that she needs a kick in the butt. Alec’s voice mail message might reveal more about the child than it does his own personality.

Think about it: We have a rich little girl with famous parents. Let’s go ahead and assume Alec has a fragile ego; kids are quick to figure out how to push those buttons and do it just for fun. Kids are cruel. Anybody with kids will tell you that much is true with all kids. Now you have Kim, a pill-popping nut job with a truckload of emotional baggage on top of a fragile ego. Instead of fighting with her daughter, Kim probably encourages conflict with Alec. Would we really put it past her? We’re talking about a freak who has bared every little personal secret in countless magazine articles. Kim will do anything to evoke sympathy for herself. She’s proven that time and time again. It might not be the kid's fault, but she’s got to be a terror. We’ve all seen kids who are out of control and in those cases a Baldwin-esque rant would certainly be in order.

I’m not going to go on record and call Alec a saint. There’s no question that he’s got a big ego and some character flaws. His rant might have come from his frustration with his daughter’s behavior but he’s a celebrity in the middle of a custody hearing with a deranged woman who used to be famous. He’s got to be smarter than that. Even if his rant was more about his bruised ego than it was his daughter’s irresponsibility, he’s got to know that things like this will become public domain.

MADD about you

2007-04-10T16:21:00.000-07:00

Somebody has got to get MADD under control. The organization started by Candy Lightner in 1980 initially did a fine job addressing the issue of drunk driving. Campaigns drawing awareness to the dangers might have done more to cut drunk driving accidents but increased enforcement but stiffer penalties certainly made it difficult to suspend better judgment.

Lightner, however, left the organization in 1985 when it was hijacked by oppressive people with a selfish agenda. Candy expressed concern that MADD had abandoned its original mission and replaced it with a neo-prohibition policy. She wanted her daughter's death to precipitate a positive change, not become the catalyst for abolishing civil rights. That suspicion was confirmed by the subsequent presidents who have aggressively backed a 0.0 BAC level.

Lightner believes, and the statistics bear it out, that the current legal limit of .08 is not addressing the issue of drunk driving. People getting tickets for drunk driving are typically less than a 100 ^th of a percent over the limit and often pulled over for something incidental while the accidents are tied to people testing at .15 BAC or more. Instead of imposing arbitrary BAC threshholds, why not work to put the onus on bars to police their patrons. Boycotting a pub that regularly lets people stagger out the door with keys in hand would do more to get drunk drivers off the road than imposing penalties on people who might not be impaired.

Sobriety checkpoints are a controversial tool supported by MADD. They draw attention to the organization and demonstrate the effort, which justifies the quest for money. However, these checkpoints are not very effective. While a half a dozen police officers tend to a checkpoint, the location of which is identified well in advance, drunk drivers are careening all over the road in other locations throughout the community. Many of them plan an alternate route home from the bar. Besides, there are typically other crimes being committed. Public money and time are wasted on what is really a public relations device.

Reaction to alcohol is subjective. Some people have a higher tolerance than others so a specific BAC doesn't always address the issue of impairment. Not everybody is OK to drive at .07 and some people are sober at .10. MADD readily acknowledges this which is why they currently endorse a ZERO tolerance policy and a corresponding BAC limit of 0.0. They make a compelling case on paper but is it fair? Hell no.

The current testing mechanism isn't fair. Breath analysis devices can register a margin of error of .02-.05. That's bad news for the person who had a glass of wine with dinner and has an actual BAC of .05. If the legal limit is reduced to 0.0 three fourths of the people tested are going to get tickets. It's possible to register a .02 BAC 10 hours after consuming the last of 6 beers. If MADD is really serious about addressing the issue of drunk driving they should put some of that 50 million dollar operating budget behind more effective testing procedures or identify a realistic measurement of impairment rather than wage a witch hunt.

Punishment is another issue. Recently Tony LaRussa was in the news when he was arrested for driving under the influence. The Cardinals skipper dozed off at a traffic light and tested at .09. That's a smidge over the current legal limit and a bit under the old standard. MADD gleefully points out that at .09 LaRussa was clearly impaired but was it because of the booze or was he simply exhausted after a couple of 16 hour days? Perhaps the combination of alcohol and physical exhaustion worked together. Sleepy drivers are often more deadly than drunk drivers.

MADD and its like-minded supporters were quick to demand severe action even though Tony's only crime was holding up traffic. He admitted he was wrong and will pay the consequences in accordance with the law but MADD isn't happy. They believe he's getting off too easy. He should have been fired by the Cardinals and set on fire by Major League Baseball. They are of the attitude that he could have killed somebody and should be punished as such.

Joe Paterno got a lot of hate mail from MADD when he refused to kick a player off his team for getting a DUI. Paterno chalked it up to a stupid mistake and addressed the issue internally but didn't see anything productive coming from turning a kid's life upside down for screwing up one time. The State of Pennsylvania imposed its penalties, Paterno gave the player an earful but it wasn't good enough. MADD felt that Paterno had compromised his integrity by overlooking the deadly potential of the mistake. Had Paterno revoked his scholarship and kicked himoff the team that player might have become a chronic alcohol abuser and a repeat offender, but MADD doesn't care.

That's simply not fair. People must be held accountable for their actions but that accountability should be based on the actual consequences of the actions, not the maximum potential of those actions under different circumstances. Where do you draw the line?

MADD claims that things could have been worse if a police officer hadn't been stuck behind the napping LaRussa. They insist he could have lost control of his vehicle and run somebody over, or his foot could have slipped off the brake and he could have caused a serious accident. You could take that argument a step further and theorize that LaRussa could have crashed into a nuclear power plant and vaporized the state of Florida. Goodness, what if that had been mistaken for an attack and the President retaliated by launching a nuclear strike against China. Tony LaRussa could have destroyed the whole word!

It's just not rational to hold people accountable for what might have been, especially when you're only speculating about the negative consequences. In his impaired state Tony LaRussa could have made a wrong turn and ended up in front of a burning building in time to rush through the flames and save dozens of people. He could have staggered into a convenience store to ask for directions and broken up a robbery.

The reality is nobody knows what could have happened. Tony might have woken up, realized he was unable to drive and called himself a taxi or he might have sheepishly driven back to his room and climbed into bed unscathed. All we know is that Tony got busted for DUI for the first time in his life and nobody got hurt. No need to overreact.

The name of the organization says it all: MADD. These are angry people, many of whom lost a loved one to an alcohol related accident. The propaganda offered by this organization focuses on reckless drivers who were behind the wheel with BAC's of .20 or more. My son Johnny was killed when he ran out in front of a car traveling at 300 miles per hour. The driver was a bottle of Jim Beam. They don't seem to realize that they're illustrating the senselessness of their campaign for a lower BAC. How does a legal limit of .08 cut down on the number of people who get behind the wheel when they can't see straight? Most of the people getting citations for driving under the influence aren't guilty of anything more deadly than failing to signal a turn. Cops troll for DUI's because it's easy money and unless there's an accident the guy blowing a .083 gets the same punishment as the boozehound registering a whopping .183. Is that fair?

Instead of going after real issues MADD focuses on the money maker. Alcohol provides a measurable evil. And it attracts millions of people who want to see alcohol banned in general, not just from the highways. Even though many of the accidents attributed to alcohol often have other factors involved MADD would have you believe that booze is always bad. So if we have a 15 car pile up on an icy freeway MADD will pour over the records to see if anybody had any alcohol in their system. If one person gargled with Listerine that morning MADD is there with a lynch mob and the state patrol had better list alcohol as the culprit.

MADD doesn't concern itself with other impairment issues even though there are hazards much more deadly than somebody at .08. Cellular phones, LCD televisions and laptop computers cause more accidents than .08. People who drive while gobbling down breakfast pose a greater risk. We don't even have a reliable method for determining the level of impairment associated with illegal drugs, but MADD wants to make it illegal for people to think about drinking if they plan on driving. People are driving with no brakes and MADD wants a breathalyzer attached to every ignition.

It's not even about safety anymore. MADD has already fulfilled its purpose and refuses to accept the challenge of taking on other issues. They have a cash cow and they have greedy business associates. As long as they can connect drinking with driving, no matter how much of a stretch that connection might be, they can collect money and broker power. It's all about the bureaucracy. MADD is an organization drunk with its own influence. That's more dangerous than all the impaired drivers in the world.

LOOK AT THAT OLD GUY SING!!!!

2007-04-04T09:50:00.000-07:00

I watch American Idol. It’s not because I really like the show but once in a while somebody does a great job singing a good song. More often than not mediocrity is the best you can hope for with most contestants falling below that bar. At least Simon Cowell is there to properly humiliate the offenders.

Although it’s a highly subjective casting call sometimes real musicians make the cut. Maybe producers resign themselves to the necessity of having real performers on the show to lend a little credibility to a process that clearly favors looks, curiosity and faux charisma over true talent. Once in a while somebody nails it.

Among the better performances, Bo Bice established himself as a savvy rocker who had the guts to be judged without music or backing vocals when he belted out the Allman hit Whipping Post. Chris Daughtry never compromised his hard rock roots and delved deep into alternative rock archives to uncover a dark version of Walk the Line when American Idol inexplicably forced Johnny Cash on the ears of a pop music audience. No offense to Cash, he was great, but most people butcher his songs and end up sounding like trailer trash (Carrie Underwood). Taylor Hicks overcame a propensity for tomfoolery and Phil Donahue’s hair with a versatile, soulful voice that is wasted on the bubblegum crap American Idol has forced him to record.

Kelly Clarkson stunk on ice when she released her first album and she stunk even more when she starred in that awful movie with Justin the Weenie. Why didn’t Uncle Samuel L. Jackson sign on for that? At least Kelly’s got a little more junk in the trunk than Christina Ricci. Maybe it was the PG rating. Samuel L. apparently won’t sign on unless he is guaranteed at least four f-bombs or one “I hope they burn in hell”. For a while Kelly seemed like a wistful cocktail waitress with a decent voice and no personality, destined for a phot spread in Playboy for a quick payday before her 15 minutes expired. Fortunately she found herself and became a musical force after getting the cheese out of her system. She still might knock out a Playboy centerfold.

American Idol is designed to be cheesy. Gwen Stefani has limited talent which was hidden behind the eclectic talents of No Doubt. On her own she is a gangly, less talented version of Madonna. Her solo hits are indulgent, made for video exercises in musical futility. If I could escape, I’d leave Gwen Stefani’s music behind. Still, American Idol had to have her as a guest. After giving contestants bad advice, possibly to ensure they wouldn’t out sing her, she delivered a horrible performance of one of her awful songs.

Diana Ross night was equally cheesy. Ross was always a fine entertainer but her vocals paled in comparison to the likes of Gladys Knight and Aretha Franklin. Today, Diana Ross simply isn’t relevant and her performance showed the world that her voice has taken a few steps back. We can’t take anything away from her, but forcing performers who could be her grandchildren to perform her catalogue of dated material results is bad entertainment.

Today’s performers understand cultural fusion. Modern pop music is a combination of everything. Tim McGraw performed a duet with Nelly that went to the top of the charts. The HOT 100 is peppered with songs that are either raps or feature heavy hip hop hooks. Times have changed. Guys like Barry Manilow have always been punchlines but now they are out of touch. Peter Noone might have made teenaged girls swoon back in 1960, but 47 years later nobody really cares what he has to say. Now the guy writing the songs that make the whole world sing is Timbaland.

Most musicians are influenced by who they listened to while growing up which means that today’s American Idol performers relate to people who were cranking out hits 10 or 15 years ago. Sometimes really dedicated musicians explore much older music but most don’t care to make that connection. There’s nothing wrong with that. There is a lineage there so the stars of the 1960’s still have some genetic material floating around in today’s music but aside from a select few, most of that influence is indirect. Instead of Smokey Robinson or Quincy Jones, American Idol needs to track down Teddy Riley and Babyface.

Last night was a classic example of a really bad American Idol idea: Tony Bennett. There are plenty of people who love the guy and you have to respect somebody who still loves performing at 80 years of age. Tony Bennett is worthy of respect but he’s so far removed from today’s music it’s not a good connection. The performances revealed two things: the songs and music were boring, and that type of music is really forgiving to mediocre performers. Tony Bennett sings a bleached version of jazz. Vocals are subtle, smooth and restrained. The music is light and lively but never raucous. Nobody gets to bust loose and show any soul or personality.

I’m 36 and I don’t like Tony Bennett. My parents don’t like him much either, which is bad news for Tony because my father owns a Captain and Tennille album…maybe two. On the list of lame music that’s got to be top three. You have to go back to my grandparents before you touch the generation Tony Bennett relates to best and I can only assume my grandparents didn’t like Tony either because they couldn’t stand Sinatra. Tony Bennett is like a less energetic version of Frank Sinatra. It’s lounge schmaltz.

People try to avoid saying anything bad about Tony Bennett because he’s such a venerable pop culture figure. Most people don’t care for his music at all but they like the fact that he’s still got a little vitality. It’s heartening to see a guy his age still active and able to perform. His shows are a novelty to most people.

It’s not my desire to offend Tony Bennett. He’s never given me any reason to dislike him but I can’t stand his music. It’s just slightly less objectionable than country music. His music and style isn’t timeless at all. He has a career because he is a living historical exhibit and that’s not a bad thing, but he’s got no business telling 20 year-old kids how to impress a younger audience.

It’s unlikely any of the contestants were thrilled to sing his style of music and I wasn’t excited to hear it. The only possible way to salvage the evening would have been for somebody to arrange the songs with all of that big band sound trashed in favor of stripped down guitars. It’s hard to put a rock edge on something like I’ve Got Rhythm but somebody should have tried.

And it’s not as though Tony has any real appreciation for today’s music. He took subtle shots at the performers as they tried to inject a little youth into his tired old play list. He told Beatboxing Blake that one song was written before rap and he should stay true to it. He complimented one of the singers because she could carry tune and added that it was rare these days. Isn’t that a version of “you kids these days”?

American Idol would have you believe that Tony Bennett and the style of music he represents is loved by all…that there is no generation gap, but there is. Sure people still applaud for him when he sings but are they applauding the performance or the fact that the old coot lived through it? Are they truly entertained or are they entertaining him?

We don’t have to like it. That’s what entertainment is all about. I know what I like and Tony Bennett is not on that list. I wouldn’t go to a Tony Bennett concert unless I was paid to be there and there is a very good chance I ‘d balk at a paid appearance. Tony Bennett probably wouldn’t bother going to a Fallout Boy show unless he got six figures so it’s all good. Even Steven. There’s nothing wrong with a healthy generation gap. It’s only too bad American Idol didn’t see it that way before they dusted off that tired old list of songs.

Women need to get real

2007-03-29T07:59:00.000-07:00

As emaciated starlets and wafer thin models dominate the media with their skeletal figures, real women around the country obsess about our society’s unhealthy infatuation with physical perfection and point a chubby finger at men. As if men simply won’t take a sexual interest in somebody a fraction under a perfect “10”.

Please. Men aren’t that demanding.

Don’t get me wrong, we like hot women just as women like muscular young men with a frightening paucity of body hair. But men simply aren’t that choosey. Sure, Hollywood casting procedures certainly favor men. Recently a shriveled old Harrison Ford played the leading man to the smoking hot and decades younger Virginia Madsen and such discrepancies are rather commonplace. 60 year-old actors get to have 20 year-old love interests. That’s the way Hollywood works. So Virginia Madsen has to put up with Harrison Ford’s breath reeking of Super Poly Grip.

Madsen’s story is interesting. Though attractive and talented, Virginia has struggled to become a mainstream star. Before breaking through with a strong performance in Sideways her claim to fame was Candyman. She simply couldn’t find good parts. This might be thanks to the fact that she’s a little fuller figured than most starlets. For some reason Hollywood likes bony white girls. Men don’t mind the curves at all. Most men would rather see Virginia Madsen naked than Nicole Kidman but for some reason Virginia has struggled to find that big name following.

Her brother has not. Michael isn’t in the stratosphere with Brad Pitt but he’s much more poplar than his sister. Women find him appealing in spite of the fact that he’s paunchy and has a massive head with a flat face. He’s not an attractive man but he exudes personality. It’s unfair that he’s enjoyed more success in his career than his sister given the fact that she’s more talented and much easier on the eyes.

Women set the market. The models adorning the covers of magazines like Cosmo, Self and Shape are much thinner than those featured in publications such as Maxim, FHM and Playboy. Men like tits and ass. Women don’t.

When women buy clothing they don’t want to see it displayed on regular women, they want to see what it looks like on models that have impossible measurements. Most women aren’t 6 feet tall and those few who are don’t weigh 115 pounds. But if Victoria’s Secret draped its wares on real women real women wouldn’t spend that kind of money on fancy panties. Nobody wants to lift and separate lop-sided flapjack boobies.

Furthermore, men don’t force fat old men on society. We’re happy that women still find Harrison Ford attractive and thrilled that fat slobs like Jack Black have groupies. It means that we don’t have to become obsessed with our bodies. Women dictate that trend too. Frankly, I found the romantic connection between Sean Connery and Catherine Zeta Jones almost as unsettling as her marriage to Michael Douglas. She could have nixed that role in Entrapment and she should have held out for a younger husband. She just digs old guys. Men aren’t calling those shots, women are. The reason you don’t see Beverly D’Angelo marrying somebody 25 years her junior is because she isn’t open to it. The reason you don’t see Lauren Hutton playing Harrison Ford’s wife is because women won’t buy tickets to see that. Men don’t need romantic scenes, we have porn.

The vexing part of this debate is that the women who complain the loudest aren’t “average.” I used to work with this pig who was 5’2” and weighed every bit of 300 pounds. She was disgusting and ate constantly. She was also loud and unhappy. One day she went off on some rant about men holding women to impossible standards of beauty and had the audacity to characterize herself as “a bigger girl with curves”. Bullshit.

This woman didn’t have curves, she had a circumference. She’s the reason Pluto was downgraded and if Mercury doesn’t shape up she’ll bump it off the list next. The problem is, if this bitch gets any fatter the solar system will start revolving around her. She already has a ring of debris orbiting around her. It’s mostly bread crumbs and that orange cheese powder that falls off or Doritos but I think I saw a couple of Milk Duds in there after Halloween and I know a doughnut got caught in her gravitational field one day but she ate it before it could establish an orbit.

And that’s the problem. Women like her need to feel bad about how they look. They shouldn’t excuse themselves for being morbidly obese. Having a little junk in the trunk is not only acceptable, it’s desirable…but when a pair of coulottes looks like a thong you’re draggin’ too much wagon. Way too much. I like big butts, but I can’t abide by fat asses. Queen Latifa is the classic example of a big beautiful woman but ad another 20 pounds to that frame and you’re crossing the line. In fact, when Queen first broke through in the rap business back in the late 1980’s she was a little heavier and much less attractive. She’s lost quite a bit of weight but It’s quite obvious that she’s not skipping any meals. And that’s a good thing.

The reason emaciated models are the norm is because they are an impossible standard. Obese women can resign themselves to never being able to get that skinny. Fat women love stories of anorexia because they get to pat themselves on the back for resisting the siren call of physical beauty while they scarf down another Quarter Pounder with Cheese. Then, when nobody will date them for fear of getting stuck in a fold, they blame their problems on men.

So stop beating men up for the image of feminine beauty our society subscribes to. Men have long been known to happily take whatever they can get. If women would reject dangerously skinny actresses and models, men would ogle their beefier replacements with the same juvenile zeal.

Out there and loving every minute of it.

2007-01-18T17:00:00.000-08:00

A growing trend in Hollywood is the public outing of gay celebrities. Apparently the idiot public is supposed to be stunned when it's revealed that somebody like Lance Bass is gay. Like we didn't see that coming.

When you consider the lifestyle that a celebrity has to live it's actually a wonder that more aren't gay. Not too many straight men are willing to sit in a chair and get worked over by a hair and makeup team every day. Maintaining celebrity status is such a critical part of staying on top of the business that most stars have to treat every waking minute like a photo opportunity which means all stars, even the macho ones, have to primp and preen at all times. Even if a guy goes into the business straight it's got to be impossible to stay that way. One bad shot of a studly star covered in powdered cheese dust and a career is in the tank.

The only straight guys who have a chance are the character actors who are expected to be a little homely but the artsy nature of the business tends to attract the theatrical personality only repressed homesexuality can hone.

Sure there are straight Hollywood couples but how long do they last? A typical Hollywood marriage last about as long as a typical fling in the real world. Marriage is not so much a binding agreement as it is a press release. Hollywood couples seem to get married in order to capitalize on public interests. Timing is everything. Marriages are quickly finalized at the exact moment interest in that couple trends downward, then they get to ride the marriage spike.

Children aren't even a sign of heterosexuality. Kids are easy money. Brad Pitt and Angelina sold first dibs on baby pictures for more money than David Schwimmer has seen since he walked off the set of Friends for the last time. Tom Cruise, who has emphatically declared his heterosexuality by marrying a mime, held out for quite some time with his baby pics before accepting the fact that his baby, who is butt ugly, wasn't worth as much as Brad's.

Homosexuality is so natural in Hollywood it almost seems as though these dramatic public outings are designed to catapult B-list stars back on to the A-list. Think about Lance Bass. Aside from a handful of 300 pound virgins who dreamed that Lance would romantically deflower them who really thought he was straight. The shocker is that Justin Timberlake hasn't been outed yet. Lance was a distant memory just before he was outed in a gossip blog and for about three days the story had him in the news. He parlayed his trauma into a couple of interviews, posed for some pictures and milked his popularity just long enough to make his break up with his lover a public matter. Now he's back to being a has been.

The men are just following a trend the women milked 10 years ago. After wearing out lesbianism women moved on to parental abuse, psychological trauma and now woman have come back around to eating disorders. Everybody wants to be the next Karen Carpenter. You can bet that 10 years from this very day Ethan Suplee will weigh in at a gaunt 100 pounds.

The Smell of Christmas

2006-12-21T03:26:00.000-08:00

"Children, behave!" screamed Mrs. McGowan. But she'd already lost control of the class. It all started when Scott Headley turned a stunning shade of red seconds before ripping a loud one during the midst of a threat-induced silence. The entire class probably believed they would remain silent until that pre-holiday break dismissal but no child can resist the siren call of the wind. Like it or not farts is funny.

It wasn't just a fart, mind you, this was an epic, echoing emission that featured an engaging structure similar to a short play. There was a defining beginning, an entertaining middle and a climatic finish. It varied in tone and pitch. It was operatic, covering at least a full octave. Those within a few feet of Scott would later claim that this fart might have had an epilogue as Scott's bowels slowly recovered from the taxing affair.

This was an experience for all the senses. It was long enough in duration to attract the eye and those who had a clear view of Scott could see his large body lifted on a small cushion of air. At least they hoped it was air. Of course there was sound, so much so that the echoes charged through the door, down the hallway and bounced off the single-pane windows at the front of the building. The rumors that the vibration was detected by the U.S. Geological Survey in Ashtabula are probably untrue, but those in the classroom felt its presence.

Mrs. McGowan heard it and went to her grave believing it was not flatus at all but a juvenile sound effect perpetrated for the sole purpose of ruining her holiday. And ruined it was for all she could think about was getting even with those horrible children in Mrs. Schaub's homeroom and maybe getting even with Schaub as well; after all it was her untimely absence that forced that unruly mob on her. McGowan was so angry she quit teaching and became a police officer in the hopes she would be able to shoot children and that's where she met her untimely demise, but that's another story for another time.

Had Mrs. McGowan stayed in the room instead of slamming the door and storming away, she would have realized that it was real. A strange aroma of eggs and bologna wafted through the air giving everybody pause. The smells were so distinct and recognizable the entire class first wondered if they were unrelated to the rectal release...perhaps somebody had opened up a lunch box. Then an odor that seemed to emit from whatever level of hell sweaty socks and dirty diapers are sent to crept into unwary nostrils and almost everybody threw up in their mouths a little.

Only one student was spared the horrifying aroma that seemed as though it would cling to everybody for decades to come. In fact, Chad DeVaughn developed an obsessive compulsive disorder linked to the experience that drives him to shower no less than four times each day. To this day, at 40, Chad can't hold down a job because nobody wants to work with somebody drenched in Old Spice. It's the only cologne strong enough to mask the imaginary smell Chad believes is now embedded in his DNA.

One student, Fred Debord, was spared the smell but, moments after the last nose suffered the consequences of going to school that day, Fred suffered the cruelest fate of all. Fred had allergies. Not the fake allergies so many people claim to have so others fawn over them and ruin entire dinner recipes on their behalf, but actual allergies. Fred suffered from chronic nasal congestion and always had a concretion of boogers preventing public access to his nose. The mucus was so thick and dense that it looked like somebody had packed each nostril tight with yellow Play-Doh. Fred was a mouth breather.

At first he thought it was funny. He might have thought it ironic but as an eighth grader he had only just begun to see that word in context and didn't quite understand its complex meaning. If he really understood irony he might have held his laughter because he would have known that sometimes irony keeps on twisting. This time it twisted right back to him and he got to experience Scott's assault on the last of the senses: taste. Due to the embarrassing nature of public emissions, it's not hard to imagine a fart making somebody cry. It happens everyday. A person might not realize that the gas is there but then they reach for a folder in a meeting and out comes flatus. What do you do? Nobody knows until it happens to them. It's like asking what you would do if you were stranded on a desert island. The possibility seems so remote none of us ever really fathom it. But farts happen a lot more often. Sometimes the farter is reduced to tears while the fartees laugh uncontrollably. Tears of laughter don't count as crying. Even so, farts rarely cause true physical anguish.

Most eighth graders have no idea what mustard gas can do. Those soldiers who survived the attacks in the trenches of World War I never recovered from the horrific images of people writhing in pain as the gas slowly sucked the life out of them. Nobody died the day that Scott broke wind but when the molecules of that heinous compound bonded with the enzymes in Fred's saliva the class was witness to one of the most pitiful displays of human suffering anybody could ever imagine.

One second Fred was laughing, in that wheezy way mouth breathers laugh, enjoying a rare moment of coming out on top. His boogers had saved him. Then his eyes widened and he clamped both hands over his mouth desperately trying to prevent what had already started. Then he gagged. The combination of laughter and revulsion in the classroom turned into horror as Fred heaved and coughed so forcefully it seemed as though he might turn inside out. His compacted boogers oozed from his nostrils like thick worms and tears squirted from his eyes. He fell to the floor, writhing and gagging and crying trying to force the toxic stench from his palate.

But it was too late. For what seemed like hours, Fred's body raged against the fart trying to keep it from doing whatever it would eventually do to Fred's fragile body. If cat hair could send this poor boy to the hospital, what would something as potent as Scott's fart do to him? Eventually Fred's body just gave up and the convulsions stopped, leaving Fred in a crumpled pile on the floor sobbing. He moaned over and over, "I can taste it. I can taste it."

When it became evident Fred would survive, his misery inspired more spirited laughter. Something so profound should be appreciated in all its glory. The new round of laughter and ensuring antics such as the mocking of Fred DeBord and the nicknaming of Scott Headley drew the stern attention of Mrs. McGown who stormed back into the room to demand what everybody thought was so disgusting.

Her rage made it clear she meant business and laughter abruptly stopped which is a dangerous thing. Genuine hysterical laughter must be contained through a progression of physiological devices. Laughter should subside into chuckles and chuckles into giggles and then giggles can be carefully stifled into silence. Packing the energy of laughter into respectful silence in one fell swoop only compounds the hysterics.

Again, Mrs. McGown demanded to know the source of the laughter. In her tiny little world she must have assumed the laughter was at her expense and she intended to confront the hooligan who saw fit to make her the butt of a joke. The laughter remained trapped behind a wall of deafening silence, but you could sense the unstable nature of Mrs. McGowan's control.

"For the last time," she yelled, " What is so FUNNY?" She bellowed the last word and her face turned a pulpy shade of red that looked like the inside of a watermelon. It was clear that she was going to kill everybody if somebody didn't answer.

Mark Wright, coincidentally seated directly behind Scott, broke the ominous silence with something so outrageous and unheard of that the entire class was stunned. Even Mrs. McGowan who had assumed, up to that point, that she knew everything...after all she had a teaching degree from the esteemed Youngstown State University...was shocked by it.

Mark Wright told the truth:

"Scott farted, that's all."

He didn't laugh. He looked Mrs. McGowan right in the eye and simply told her exactly what the ruckus was all about. He was stoic. For that one moment in time (that would be a great prom theme) Mark Wright was a god.

McGowan's head seemed to spin 360 degrees and her eyes might have actually exploded in their sockets only to be instantly replaced by the second set of eyeballs everybody from her home planet had stored in the place humans have their senses of humor. Scott, upon being identified as the culprit shivered in his seat and let out a lone whimper.

McGowan stepped toward Scott and looked down on him with a degree of loathing so intense the entire class was certain Scott was going to burst into flames, which was a frightening prospect given the fact that subtle hints of his fart still lingered in the air. But Mrs. McGowan must have realized that she was on the verge of revealing her true alien identity and she reigned in her powers. "You're a disgusting pig," She seethed at Scott. "and the rest of you are a bunch of dirty little poop monkeys."

That was it. There are two things teachers should never say if they wish to maintain control over their students." Hump Day" is one and "Poop" is the other. There are lots of words and phrases that will trigger jokes and laughter but "Hump Day" and "Poop" are universal. In fact, the word "poop" tends to trigger laughter in the most serious adult. It's a funny word. Even though it's not considered a curse word, "poop" is far more powerful than the allegedly vulgar "shit".

The improperly suppressed hysteria exploded into uproarious laughter. Eighth graders were rolling on the floor in uncontrollable spasms of full-body guffawing. Guffawing! Can you imagine that? Some laughed so hard they passed out for lack of breathing only to come to and laugh again. Everybody was laughing, except for Fred who could still detect the taste of unholy death on the back of his tongue. For the rest of his life Fred existed in a semi-catatonic state mumbling incoherent things to anybody who approached him.

Again, she stormed out of the room in a huff slamming the door behind her as she left, convinced she has been lied to and that the joke was really about her. In her hateful little mind she had every intention of leaving that classroom full of idiots locked in the school over winter break to freeze to death, but the principal happened to walk by as that final class period eded and he let Mrs Schaub's homeroom go, unaware of what had happened but making a mental note to inform the cleaning crew to give room 118 some special attention.

Figuring out men.

2006-12-04T18:39:00.000-08:00

I saw a book today that supposedly outlined a script men follow when they are cheating. It was written by two women which leads me to believe that a couple of harpies who got burned by their men decided to pen a bitch session about what happened and pass themselves off as experts.

In their case there's a good chance that their borderline lesbian relationship made their husbands paranoid and drove them to cheat, but I'll admit that most men don't need to be chased into the arms of another woman. Too many men are shameless pigs who will cheat on their wives and girlfriends if given the opportunity. Mind you most men won't pursue an affair, but if an affair finds them too many will readily oblige.

As a man, I have seen associates who are married hit on women. Sometimes this is a game played by the ego to measure viability but most of the time it's what a sub commander would call active pinging. These guys are looking for a hook up. Fortunately rejection is the most common outcome. The good news for married women is that most guys set their sights too high when they're married. It's like a minor league player taking a shot at the majors, most of the time it doesn't pan out.

Men also like to troll for potential affairs. This technique is really common in at work where men will tell attractive coworkers that their relationship is failing. Sometimes this lands a sympathetic ear and the man can set the ground work for an ongoing discrete affair. The woman he is approaching believes he is trying to untangle a complicated relationship so he can emerge unfettered while the wife at home has no idea that her husband seeking the affections of another. If the coworker is smart she'll demand to see divorce papers before she proceeds. If she's really shrewd she'll call the wife to confirm the problems.

The biggest threat to a relationship is that rare woman who seeks out married men. They take the initiative and move in aggressively. They readily remove the traditional obstacles from their end leaving fidelity resting on the foundation of love and loyalty. Even those men who resist the urge to approach women actively or passively find themselves struggling to resist the temptation of a no strings attached physical relationship.

All men are capable of cheating. That doesn't mean all men will, but most will be tempted at some point in a relationship. There's no script or formula out there and women who read books by jilted counterparts who think they have all the answers are in for a world of hurt. People are as different as snowflakes and assuming that something as simplistic as a script will apply to your situation is nothing short of irresponsible. You might not be ready for a relationship if you think these books will help.

Taking advice from a woman, especially a woman scorned is the worst thing to do. Women have a very nasty tendency of projecting their own problems on to others. If a woman believes she is in an abusive relationship she will believe you are in one as well. Some are really good at playing on insecurities and converting others to their cause. It's like a cult. A miserable, menstrual cult of man-hating.

If your relationship is damaged enough where you think you need to buy a book to figure out whether or not your man is cheating on you it would be wise to pocket the money and break it off. At that point the trust is gone. It doesn't matter if you have just cause or if you're being irrational. That relationship is no longer viable.

No, it doesn't give you that closure where you can go "Waiting to Exhale" on your man, but is that sort of drama really necessary?

Some people like to say that cheating is the symptom of deeper problems in the relationship. That's not the case. There are certainly instances where that applies but in most cases it's a matter of poor impulse control. I don't know if women share the same problem or if it's a "Y" chromosome kind of thing. I suspect women are just as flawed as men even if they won't readily admit it.

If you want to know if your man is cheating on you you're better off listening to your heart than you are listening to your friends. His friends might provide a better clue than yours. If it seems like his buddies are suddenly friendly or being a little forward in hitting on you, it might be because they know something you don't. Maybe they have reason to believe you'll be on the market soon and a test drive is in order. It sounds sick, but men aren't wired for pleasantries. In man world it's uncool to go after another man's mate so taking that risk means something isn't right. If anything it demonstrates that your man has poor taste in friends.

The bottom line is that you go into a relationship alone and nobody can help you. If they try it only makes matters worse. Your best friend won't be objective. If you can't count on your friends to help, why would you shell out 17 bucks to let a couple of bitches from New York give you bad advice.

American Direct Inc: Bringing you the latest in a long line of scams.

2006-06-29T17:22:00.000-07:00

Let me depart from my normal mode of irreverent satire and mount my high horse so that I may impart a little bit of wisdom to the masses...at least the smattering of people who occasionally stumble across my blog. A blog that I carefully write on a surprisingly regular basis. A blog that contains a superior degree of narrative professionalism. A blog, that I humbly submit, might be among the most readable articles available in mass media. The internet is mass media. I am a journalist. Hey, if those carpet baggers on Fox can call themselves journalists I should be able to call myself one too. Hell, if they pass for journalists I should be able to pass as a brain surgeon. Ass clowns.

OK, it's bullshit. Like so much of the garbage floating out there today, but at least I'm not writing about my cat. I wouldn't do that. She made me sign a confidentiality agreement.

Moving along, I think I should start my American Direct story by providing you some background. I am what people commonly refer to as a loser. I disagree, mind you, opting to label myself as creatively efficient and even a little precocious, but I realize that there are a lot of people who don't see me that way at all. Fortunately that is a small group of people formally referred to as my family. Just kidding. Sort of.

It's not that the road I have taken is less traveled so much as it has not been a direct route. The interesting thing is that in spite of failing to take the freeway to get where so many of us go, by bending a few rules and taking a few shortcuts I am exactly where I should be. In many ways I am well ahead of where I should be. How else can you explain a 35 year-old with four grand kids? You heard me! So what's this got to do with American Direct? Wait! Who is American Direct, Inc.? And why is this Steve V. C. character continuously typing the name American Direct in his blog?

Part of it is to make that name stick in your head. American Direct. Say with me! American Direct. Incorporated. Got it? Of course you do. The other reason is that Google will catch that name in my blog and position it based on the number of times it appears in this file. I believe that American Direct deserves to be given full attention. AMERICAN DIRECT!

Denny Crane.

This ties into my life as a loser because as a loser I have been sucked into a number of scams. Like paying $300 for information on how to become an air traffic controller and earn a six figure income while flying the world for free. Right. But I was 20 and stupid. I also took several jobs that were scams. Jobs that promised to promote me to management within a few months. Then I was sent out to middle class neighborhoods to sell $1200 sets of encyclopedias. This was in the early 1990's before Al Gore invented the internet and people could look stuff up for free. I also sold junk jewelry to people at work. Wanna buy this rope chain? Scams.

I have encountered several others throughout my life, but my experience in being scammed as well as being asked to scam insulated me from being sucked in. I know when something isn't legit and I can walk away. That's a great feeling. And before you start thinking that it's easy, let me just say that it's not at all. Don't assume that scam artists are stupid people. They are often very intelligent and highly perceptive. Scam artists could probably form a club, set IQ as a qualifying factor and Mensa wouldn't get in.

Some very smart people get screwed by scams such as the one I recently observed at a company that goes by the name American Direct. They even ensconce themselves in Old Glory and feature a magnificent eagle in their imagery. Patriots don't screw people over. That's why Trugreen Chemlawn ran out and slapped American flags on their trucks and uniforms right after 9-11. I know because I even got scammed by them. But that's another story. American Direct is the here and the now.

American Direct's scheme is membership shopping. We're not talking about soft scams like Costco and Sam's Club. Those places spell it out for you and anybody who can do math can recognize that those wholesale clubs don't pass the smell test. Not unless you habitually buy 62% fat hamburgers in 30 pound packages. Nope. American Direct promises to cut you in on capitalism's dirty little secret: Factory pricing. They wave suspicious invoices and mysterious distributor catalogues in front of their marks showing them the differences between the retail price and the price the manufacturer charges for goods right off the assembly line. Which, to be honest, is a huge difference but not quite as dramatic as that portrayed by American Direct.

Now let me be above board. I don't know that American Direct, Inc. is lying about the fact that they can attain goods at a price well below the retail price. It's quite possible that they do save some money for those who agree to join the club, or co-op as they call it. In fact, I suspect that they do save just enough money to prevent them from being locked up for fraud. But their marketing tactics have scam written all over them.

First they hit you with the phone call. Basic sweepstakes telemarketing to selected zip codes that are likely to yield results. Blue collar types. Middle income. Potentially dense. They tell you that you are a guaranteed winner who will receive one of five prizes with the top prize being a BRAND NEW TRUCK!!! Notice that it's not a car. Demographics. Joe Nascar don't want no hatchback.

It's harmless. They don't want anything from you over the phone. Just let them send a brochure about the contest, which is easy to accept. A few days go by and the packet comes in the mail. Once again, it's vague. They don't tell you what they want, but to claim you guaranteed prize you have to show up and endure a "presentation". No strings attached...you are guaranteed a great prize.

Let me say that I knew this was a scam from the start. These things always are. They probably never give away the top prize and stick people with the prize of least value which is usually some certificate for a couple of nights in some motel room outside of Branson, Missouri...or as I like to call it: hell. Sorry, but rednecks and white trash converging in the same fetid sweatbox for good old fashioned "white" entertainment is not my idea of a good time. Granted they do have several options which include Orlando, Gatlinburg and Honolulu. Orlando is lard ass tourist heaven, Gatlinburg is like a KKK meeting with rides and Honolulu is a pipe dream because anybody who can afford the flight out there isn't going to want to hole up in some Days Inn 3 miles inland. Scam. American Direct.

But if that's not enough to convince you that American Direct is a scam, let's skip past the routine presentation, which includes audience participation and a lot of energy, and move right to the close. That's where the fun is. You see, they don't tell you anything about the price of membership until they have completely run through the pitch and even addressed some personal needs to get you on that hook. The price is a dead giveaway that something is amiss.

American Direct, Inc. has a two part price. The annual membership fee is only $200. Very reasonable for a club that promises to deliver savings of 50% off of the lowest retail price on the open market. In fact, I might have sprung for $200 and immediately ordered a plasma screen T.V. for $500 since that's the price they claimed I could grab it for. Even though I doubt that I would ever see it since this place had the look and feel of a fly by night operation that was only going to be in that site as long as they could book pigeons for their presentations.

But they wanted a start up fee. A one time initial payment that would help us all escape from the shackles of retail forever. After a very dramatic rally the final lock to this mystical land was revealed: $1999. That's one thousand nine hundred ninety-nine dollars. Two grand. Cha-ching. American Direct needed to secure this payment in order to pay the bills and acquire factory direct goods from every manufacturer in the world. Ouch. American. Direct. Scam. Inc.

American Direct realizes that it didn't invite wealthy people to participate in this so they can take payments on the initial installment and they claim to be willing to let you name the terms. I didn't see if they would take $10 a month for the next 200 months, but I suspect that they floated that $199 annual fee out there to set a baseline. If anybody offered less than that they had to balk. I've seen that game played before. They weren't taking less than $200. My litmus test was a little different.

I told the girl who was assigned as my closer that I needed to verify the company. She was nice and I could tell that she was just a naive little girl who got sucked into some job that was not what she thought it would be. 15 years ago I was in her shoes, working around sleazy guys in cheap gold chains with too much product in their hair. I know she wanted to jump in front of a train and I wanted to tell her that McDonald's offered a better career path. She was in the wrong place. When I politely and effectively shut her down, she deferred to one of the sleazy supervisors who walked in wearing pinstriped pants and a black silk shirt with too many buttons opened. If he weren't so young I think I would have ripped him to pieces but I laid low, played the part and stroked him to see if I could get two days to make a decision. No dice. Pay now. American Direct.

That's your cue. Any legitimate deal is going to be there tomorrow. I'm not talking about buying some collectible item or buying a prime piece of real estate. There are some purchases you have to make quickly, but a membership service is not one of them. Especially when they give you no information up front and make nothing available for public review. Anything you have to buy now, is something you can verify the actual value of now. You won't hear of American Direct unless you go to a presentation and you can't learn about how they really work unless you pay. Their website requires a password and offers no insight into their operation. SCAM!

American Direct, Inc. asks you to take a leap of faith. They require a large investment up front and provide you with no way to try them out to see if they're for real. Everything they say sounds too good to be true and in order to find out if it is, you have to hand them a check. Anybody that does is asking for trouble. If American Direct calls you, go ahead and go to the presentation. See if your key starts the Ranger, let yourself get excited about the world of direct purchasing but when they ask for your money ask them to give you three days to make a rational decision. Their answer should speak for itself. Better yet tell them that you'd like a 30 day free trial. Tell them you'll agree to pay the full membership fee up front upon delivery of your first three purchases. They won't do it. They'll give you every excuse in the book from contractual obligations to state business regulations, but they won't let your become a member until you hand them your money.

I could call the BBB or the Attorney General's office but why? First, they won't do anything. The Better Business Bureau is a bigger fraud than anything that has ever been reported to them. They do nothing outside of waste time and collect membership dues. Just like Angie's list or Who's Who among American High School Students. Pay a fee and you can be famous too. Or reputable. The AG is almost as bad. In Ohio, the AG basically collects a salary to prepare for a run at the Governor's office. They don't do a dammed thing. Except waste taxpayer dollars. And take bribes. Too bad there isn't some sort of legal official who is elected to make sure politicians do their jobs... Secondly, I don't want to bust them. I think that companies like American Direct serve a valuable purpose.

Actually they serve several. One is that they provide people with limited principals a means to earn a living. Crooks have to eat too, right? Would you rather they screw over people stupid enough to hand them money or do you find stick up men more honorable? Personally, I favor these scam artists over politicians anyday. I can protect my money from the scam artists. Politicians just take it from me. Honestly I prefer robbers to politicians. Yes, I would rather be car jacked than taxed. I would rather be gang raped, beaten and left for dead by a gang of Amish bikers than endure the endless heist that is American politics.

Another purpose is education. Julie, the girl who tried to close me at American Direct, is just a young girl trying to make her way. I respect that. She's in a bad spot and has to hate her job. I know I did. She'll figure it out and emerge a better person. She'll take a lousy experience with a crappy company and parlay that into a fine career. She'll learn not to define yourself by your job. It's the other way around and sometimes there are jobs that just aren't worth doing. Walk away. In fact, she's learning more about the real world at American Direct than she could in any business class in any college. Take that, Yale. Speaking of scams, eh?

Sorry, folks, but a college education isn't worth much more than the paper the degree is printed on. Sometimes that degree can attain a nice salary for you, but that degree doesn't mean that you aren't a complete moron. In fact, that degree sometimes inhibits your ability to realize that you're an asshole and everybody knows it. You think that paper tells you that you're smart and educated, when it actually says you took four years off while a lot of people were actually learning something meaningful. Well in my economics 101 class...Guess what, the real world is so far past Econ 101 it's not funny. You could get a PhD in Economics and still not get it. That's why these guys at American Direct don't have degrees. That's also why they are rich. Sorry, but doing keg stands every other night and skipping that 10:00 leadership class to recover is not preparing you for the real world. Going to it isn't either. Julie is getting a masters degree in life and if she can keep her chin up and push through it, she's going to be just fine.

As much as I loath the game American Direct plays, I have to respect what they ultimately accomplish. In 3 years they'll be gone on and the owners will be setting up their latest racket, but the suckers still be lining up. They really are born every minute and with NASCAR steadily sucking brain cells out of the middle class, thousands are being created every day. For every dollar they scam, soul they steal and dream they crush, five strong people will emerge a little wiser and a lot stronger. American Direct helped me hone skills I developed the hard way. Maybe Julie's building those skills right now. At American Direct.

Redneck TV

2006-06-14T19:45:00.000-07:00

I used to think Jeff Foxworthy was a funny guy. There was a time when he was making fun of white trash and inbred hicks. Now he ensconces himself in that shroud of ignorance and laughs all the way to the bank. Larry the Cable guy started out as a parody of the stereotypical hick, but somehow he's become some cultural hero that people almost look up to.

The two of them anchor a show entitled Blue Collar TV. Somehow elevating their trivial and tired acts into some sort of working class celebration. As somebody who comes from a blue collar background I find it insulting to assume that everybody in the working class would be entertained by the stupid crap these hacks foist upon their viewing audience.

I don't begrudge these guys making money. Nothing would give me more joy than to realize a revenue source in making a complete ass of myself and if I could exploit some niche market to maintain a lucrative following I am certain I would pander to that audience too.

My issue is with the fact that there is an audience that celebrates the disagreeable negative stereotypes portrayed by these comics. When Chris Rock did his bit on the difference between black people and niggers, he didn't embrace an audience of gang-bangers and remove the satire from his act to embrace them. He was speaking to his audience of regular people of all colors. He was bemoaning the fact that a handful of jerks ruin life for everybody by perpetrating a negative stereotype. It was a biting commentary on our society that addressed the small minority of blacks who live down to negative stereotypes while skewering whites who accept that stereotype in general. Best of all it was funny.

Foxworthy used to be funny because he made fun of a segment of white society that represents a small but very negative minority. He wasn't exceptionally cruel in his comedy, but he made fun of those hopeless morons who think it's OK to leave the trash in a pile in the back yard instead of walking it out to the curb once a week. Suddenly his You might be a redneck... schtick is like some sort of anthem for the mobile home set. It's not funny when the people you're making fun of wear that joke like some badge of honor. Foxworthy doesn't care as long as the money keeps rolling in.

Larry the Cable guy has departed from his witless banter about naked grandmothers and fart induced fires to dabble in political issues but his political commentary isn't comedy or satire. Since Larry is a character who doesn't so much tell jokes as he does portray them, the political aspect of Larry the Cable guy comes across as racist and ignorant. The lines between comedy and hate-mongering are blurred.

In fact the lines between Larry the Cable guy and his creator have become blurred to the point where Dan Whitney no longer exists. In Cars the role of Mater is credited to Larry the Cable guy. The same is true in Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector. One would think that Dan Whitney, who started out with several characters he would portray, would want to have a career outside of Larry. Eventually the novelty will wear off and Larry the Cable guy will go the way of Buster Poindexter, and other fictional characters that became part of pop culture. Sure Dan Whitney will still have the money, but will he still be trying to milk that Larry the Cable guy act 20 years from now?

I suppose that the success of this genre speaks to the ignorance of the fans. Since most of those who watch Blue Collar TV wouldn't know how to spell satire much less define it, these idiots think that Larry the Cable guy is empowering in some sort of way and that being a redneck can't be a bad thing if they talk about it on TV. They are simple minded people and the comics have resorted to very simple material to amuse their audience.

Jesus doesn't like Country Music

2006-05-24T21:19:00.000-07:00

I try to avoid country music. I try to avoid anything that makes the wrinkles in my brain smooth over, which is why I don't watch Desperate Housewives or talk to my neighbor. Somethings just make you dumber. I actually had to teach myself how to ride a bike again after trying to have a conversation with an uncle and when I hear country music on a distant radio I get a sudden urge to eat paint and make out with my sister.

Over the past few years I have been subjected to country music in the workplace, in stores or even in the occasional diner and in each instance I couldn't fathom something more objectionable. Maybe getting poked in the eye, but only if it scratched the cornea. I despise country music. No offense to old souls like Willie Nelson who is more of a folk artist than a country star and there was a time when country didn't have this in-your-face red state mentality, but to this day I can only name about 15 country songs I find redeeming and they are all at least 25 years old. Most of those songs aren't really country at all. Crazy is more of a jazz number and Walking after Midnight was only country because a white girl couldn't sing a black song and get away with it. Today it would be R&B.

Now, the uber-patriotic garbage spewed by clowns like Toby Keith has been replaced with bible-thumping Jesus music. Last year's American Idol winner, Carrie Underroos, has topped the hick charts with Jesus take the Wheel. Other artists have cranked out similar odes to the messiah as well with the sub-genre of redneck gospel seeming to peak right now. The quickest path to the top of the country charts runs right through the sacred heart of Jesus Christ.

Somehow, I don't think Jesus would be cool with that. This isn't some accident like Spirit in the Sky, Nashville is printing money by dropping the biggest name in western society, besides John Lennon that is. What we are seeing is a very conscientious decision to convert Christ into cash. Cha-Ching! Jesus loves me this I know, for my investments seem to grow. With each word I sing to thee, another royalty is sent to me.

The irony is so thick it's a wonder they can even breath. First of all, Jesus was against mixing money with religion. He committed his only documented act of aggression when he turned over tables and ran the merchants out of the temple. Now these country music hacks are writing songs about him and topping charts. They can tithe all they want, but Jesus wasn't the kind of guy who would be interested in 10%. Jesus wasn't not about the money, he was vehemently opposed to money. I don't expect much out of country singers because if they were smart they would have gotten that job managing the local Circle K, but can you spell sin? Here's a hint: I just spelled it.

But it goes deeper. Even if you took Jesus out of country music and showed the guy some respect by not profiteering off of him, he'd still be perturbed with country music. It's the type of values that are represented in country music that Jesus would have found disheartening. Jesus was a tolerant man who encouraged people to mind their own business. Judge not lest ye shall be judged...ring a bell? He didn't support the government nor did he support religious authority. Jesus was clearly an outspoken liberal. If he were alive today, he'd be labeled an America-hating pinko communist just like the Dixie Chicks and John Kerry.

Country, both the musical genre and the fan base, proved how narrow-minded and intolerant it was when the Dixie Chicks took a pre-concert shot at George W. Bush. Country fans were outraged and they gleefully burned their CD's and sent the girls death threats. Country music luminaries like Toby Keith piled on and took shots at the Dixie Chicks because it was a great opportunity to sell more records. Sadly, the free-willed legacy of country icons such as Kris Kristofferson and Willie Nelson was ignored while moronic fans and greedy artists circled their wagons around a provincial philosophy of me right, you wrong.

Jesus wouldn't be feeling it. If he does take the wheel, he'll crash into a wall to put himself out of the misery of being stuck in a car with some country singer who just doesn't get it. Carrie Underwood won American Idol because she's blond and her ass looks good in tight jeans. Don't sing about Jesus, paint on a pair of pants, squeeze into a belly shirt and shake what your momma gave you. It's got to be less of a sin to sell sex than it is to sell Jesus.

The Sports that Aren't

2006-05-08T16:58:00.000-07:00

Barry Bonds will quickly ease past Babe Ruth in the record books this spring. Nobody cares. Barry's on steroids and everybody knows it, but even without the steroids Barry is a surly jerk who disgraces the game with his selfishness and his arrogance. He could hit 800 home runs and nobody would care. Yes, he's a marvelous athlete but he's a jackass. The sooner he falls off the face of the earth the better. He's got about 2000 fans who love him, but most of them don't know a thing about baseball. If they did, they'd hate Bonds too. Charles Manson has fans too. More than Barry. That doesn't make him a hero, does it? How many rings does Barry have? None. Is it his fault? You bet. And everybody in baseball thinks it's funny.

Remember when MacGuire and Sosa invigorated the sport with their quest for the record? Bonds is driving fans away with every dinger he hits. Yes, Sosa and MacGuire were on steroids, but they were at least engaging. Fans would happily look past Barry's massive cranium and bottle fed muscles if only he could be a little bit personable. Sadly, the steroids are only a scapegoat. If Barry's prowess were thanks to nothing but the whole grain goodness of Kellogg's Frosted Mini Wheats people would still hate him. Because he's an ass. Baseball isn't a sport right now. It's a bad soap opera. Desperate Gym Thugs.

The NHL playoffs are on right now. At least that's what I've been told. I know the NBA is in the midst of its post season, but only because I'm a Cavaliers fan. Yeah, I hopped off that bandwagon a few years back, but can you blame me? Shawn Kemp took up most of the room with his 350 pounds and his 47 kids from 59 mothers. It's a good thing he played the field because he sure as hell wasn't playing basketball when he came to Cleveland. I guess he dunked a few doughnuts though. Now the Cav's have Lebron James who might actually be Superman and I'll be cheering them on until they trade him for Lamar Odom and a bowl of Chicken Corn Chowder. That's the M.O. in Cleveland.

I'd like to like hockey. I watched a Stanley Cup finals once and it was pretty good, but since then I haven't been able to stay focused. It's the same crap game in and game out. They skate really hard, slap the puck back and forth and then they fight. Hockey purists say that fighting is an integral part of the game, but I thinks it's a load of crap. If you can't settle your differences within the rules of the game there's no point in playing. Since there's no point in playing, I see no point in watching. I think I can name three players who currently play in the NHL, but I can't tell you what positions they play of if they're even any good. I really look forward to the day when I can walk up to an NHL star and tell him that yes, I really do want fries with that.

At least hockey players are athletes. They can do things that nobody else can do. I can't skate backward and I know that I couldn't keep my feet if somebody nudged me, so I have to respect the athleticism. That's not true for NASCAR. I suppose all auto racing is pretty stupid, but NASCAR's key demographic makes that version of racing all the more objectionable. These people are so foul that tornadoes make a point to hit trailer parks. I don't know if there is a god, but tornadoes definitely don't like rednecks. I can see why. Tornadoes might be more effective at culling the herd of inbred morlocks if they would sneak up on the Daytona 500. The rednecks that survived would eventually die of boredom with no NASCAR to watch.

Even if there was some little part of me that liked NASCAR I wouldn't admit it because I wouldn't want to be even remotely associated with the bottom feeders who wave NASCAR flags around like Dale Earnhardt is some kind of country. To put this in perspective, I really don't like American Idol and I don't have respect for the morons who vote after each show, but I can still admit that I watch the show. I loath NASCAR. Inbred country bumpkins driving cars around a circle really fast. Whoopee!

These guys aren't athletes. Aside from wearing adult diapers they really aren't doing anything that much more impressive than I do every morning. No I don't drive 200 miles per hour, my mini van tops out at 93, but my tires are out of balance, my struts are bad and I need an alignment. I think that the mechanical difficulty I face adds about 100 miles per hour to whatever speed I'm traveling. Let's see Jeff Gordon get to my office in 25 minutes in rush hour in that death trap. See what I'm saying?

The other non-sport of the season came this past weekend. The Kentucky Derby is what NASCAR fans did before the car was invented. Now it's supposed to be classy because the patrons dress like colonel Sanders and suck down mint juleps all day. I do declare. Elves beating horses with sticks is what passes for class these days. Not impressed. What do you think those horses might do if they didn't have some 86 pound gnome whacking them with a Fiberglas whip all afternoon? Probably mosey on over to the infield and munch on some of that sweet Kentucky Bluegrass.

I don't like watching people race around a track. I can respect it because it's impressive and I can admire the hours and hours of hard work the athlete puts in to be the best he can be. Horses don't make that kind of commitment. Sure they train, but not by choice. People have to choose. Those cars don't make choices either. They just do what they're told. Frankly, sitting on your butt while something else does all the work is not very athletic. I have more respect for bowlers than I do jockeys or drivers. I wouldn't call a bowler an athlete but I have to respect the tremendous level of skill the bowler has achieved. Driving a car or riding a horse around an oval track is idiotically simplistic. It's not really very impressive.

This is really the worst time of the year for entertainment. Poorly written season finales will segue into a summer of crappy reruns and even crappier summer specials. Baseball is months away from being interesting. The intriguing teams in the NBA will get knocked out of the playoffs leaving the Pistons and Spurs slugging it out in defensive games that feature low scores and lower ratings. Sadly gas prices are too high for people to get out and explore the world for something better. What a sad state of affairs...

Dude, where's my god?

2006-04-28T13:26:00.000-07:00

People always seem to be finding god. As though god is like a set of keys that can be misplaced.

The thing is, the people who find god are always these desperate people who are on the brink of being held accountable. Prison inmates always find god, to which we can only be thankful that god is an intangible object that can't be whittled into a shiv or a shank and used to harm other inmates. Intangibility is also convenient because inmates like to tell everybody that they found god. If god could be smoked this sort of proclamation would be dangerous because other inmates would be inclined to steal god.

You never hear about happy, successful, law-abiding people finding god. Spouses who cheat seem to find god right around the same time their affair is discovered. Drug addicts find god right before they get busted for kiting bad checks and pedophiles seem to find god three seconds after they realize that the 12 year-old boy they were instant messaging is actually a 29 year-old cop. But nobody seems to find god until they need a miracle to get out of a jam.

Too bad keys aren't like that. We've all had one of those mornings where everything seems stacked against us. We slept through the alarm, and woke up to realize that all of our work clothes are still in the washer because we forgot to put them in the drier before bed. Somehow, we manage to overcome these obstacles and find ourselves in a fine position to make up lost time by speeding to work, only to discover that our keys are gone. Eventually we find them, too often in the ignition of the car, but not until we have lost our opportunity to get to work on time.

If keys were divine, we'd only lose them when it didn't matter. Like on one of those Sunday mornings when you get a craving for an Egg McMuffin, but settle for a bowl of Captain Crunch because we couldn't find the keys. It's disappointing, but not enough to fret over. The keys will turn up. But come Wednesday when you can't miss that sales meeting those keys are hidden better than Jimmy Hoffa.

God's exactly the opposite of keys. I've looked for him, even though I really didn't need him. I didn't need those Almond M&M's either, but when I found them I still ate them and very much enjoyed their chocolate goodness. I don't know if god's as satisfying as candy-coated, chocolate-covered almonds, but I'd love to try. If only I could find him.

I suppose I'll have to wait until I shoot a nun or run over a cop, then I can only imagine god will be right there in my jacket pocket. Just like my keys.

Baby Cruise destined for trouble

2006-04-19T10:15:00.000-07:00

It's a shame that Scientologists can't avail themselves of psychiatric care. Tom Cruise is clearly in need of serious mental therapy. Isn't it obvious that he's a danger to himself an others? He could have seriously hurt himself hopping up and down on Oprah's couch, might have crushed several vertebrae in Katie Holmes' neck when he grabbed her for one of those very public I'm not gay kisses and anybody who saw his glare down with Matt Lauer knows that Cruise was inches from snatching Lauer's heart right out of his chest. Speaking of Lauer, does his vanishing hair have anything to do with Katie Couric leaving for CBS? And why would CBS hire a talking head with no lips? But I digress.

Now they let Tom Cruise have a baby. That's just wrong. Instead of trying to brainwash co-stars, Cruise can focus on building a Scientology drone from scratch. Why can Tom Cruise have a baby with a mindless bubble head when they won't let Angelina Jolie have one? I know she's pregnant but clearly authorities stepped in to stop the madness forcing Jolie to escape to a non-extradition country to have her baby. Namibia? I didn't even know that was country until she went there. Why didn't somebody do the same with Cruise? The country would be a better place if he left. Well maybe not better, but certainly a little less frightening. Every time I reach for my lithium I'm terrified Tom Cruise will leap out of my couch cushions to yell at me. I'd feel a lot better if he were in Africa somewhere preaching Scientology to cannibals. They might have good placenta recipes.

I know, the placenta thing was supposed to be a joke. But how can we be sure? Did he say it in all seriousness and then back off when he realized that it was just a step or two over the edge? And what kind of joke is that anyway? A joke would be threatening to sell the placenta on e-Bay. That's funny. But eating it? Not funny. Especially when you have already proven to the entire world that you're insane. Comedy is clearly not one of Tom's strong suits.

And what was up with Tom Cruise doing all the talking. Katie Holmes was pregnant, but yet it was always Tom talking about what kind of delivery it would be. When does the man ever have any say in the actual delivery? Most men are smart enough to shut up and be supportive, because they know what's coming. Since we don't have to squeeze something weighing around 8 pounds out of our nether regions, we know better than to pontificate about the miracle of child birth.

But not Tom. He was just as chatty as you please, talking about a drug-free and silent delivery. Eight pounds Tom! Katie weighs in at about 120 pounds and she's about to squeeze something the size of a watermelon out of an orifice that might provide a snug fit for two fingers (we can dream right?) and Tom's talking about silent deliveries? HA. No wonder he backed off those statements. Oprah probably called him and gave him a lecture on the subject.

Now that the baby has arrived, the real circus will begin. Will Cruise have the child's brain removed and modified at a scientology assimilation clinic or will he count on intensive daily instruction to mold his baby into the second coming of L. Ron Hubbard? Who knows? The only thing we know for sure is that this child is heading for one disturbing childhood.

The best part about this, is that we won't have to hear about this anymore. Now that Tom and Katie have squeezed forth their spawn, the press will focus attention on Angelina's baby. Since she's in Namibia, it's going to be hard to get information out quickly, but the preoccupation with it will distract the masses from Tom Cruise and his brat. Then of course we'll have to get Jennifer Anniston's reaction to Brad being a brand new father and we'll learn of Vince Vaughn's dark secret of impotence at the hands of mechanical bull riding contests. The point is, there is enough going on to distract us that we won't have to obsess over Tom and Kate's new baby as if it were our own.

Which might be exactly what Tom wants. He'll carefully mold his child into a Scientological warrior and before we realize the evil he has unleashed on our world it will be too late. Our planet will be overtaken by angry thetans.

Jesus vs. Easter Bunny

2006-04-12T05:59:00.000-07:00

Easter is a confusing time of year for kids. And even some adults. On one hand they're being told the story of the resurrection, which is really quite creepy, while on the other they anticipate the arrival of a giant bunny who delivers colored eggs, gifts and chocolate effigies. A quick review of the Bible does not reveal any scriptures depicting the existence of a giant bunny any where in Jesus' time. So where did he come from?

I thought the answer might be in those religious texts that theologians study but never discuss because they confuse people. I searched the web and made some calls but there were no stories that connected the dots between the Easter Bunny and Jesus Christ. Clearly the two must be connected because churches around the world sponsor Easter Egg hunts.

Knowing what I do about Christianity and how it has a long history of commandeering other deities and holidays (how else do you explain the saints and the correlation between Christian holidays and pagan rituals?) I decided that the Easter Bunny might actually be an ancient god from a forgotten religion. Clearly the Easter Bunny's powers were impressive and the Catholic Church could not successfully remove him from parlance so they found away to allow Jesus and the Easter Bunny to coexist.

But which one is better?

Jesus walked on water, healed the sick and turned water into wine (I hope it wasn't the water he walked on). Clearly he had some pretty impressive tricks up his sleeve and people loved him. They loved him so much that 2000 years later he is worshipped as a god. Until Elvis came along there was nobody who had such an enduring following. In another 1500 years Christianity might evolve to incorporate Elvis into its theology, or Elvis might end up being the cornerstone of a new religion.

On the subject of Elvis we should carefully watch how the cult around his legend develops. I remain convinced that the fact that the letters in his name can be arranged to spell "evils" is not a simple coincidence. Anyway, Elvis didn't perform any miracles. Tom Parker did by turning somebody so cool into a punch line before the Elvis was out of his prime, but Elvis wasn't a miracle worker. Jesus performed miracles.

But the Easter Bunny is a miracle worker too. First of all, the image of a giant bunny is impressive. That's a miracle in itself. Jesus was a guy. Sure his mom claims she was a virgin, but how many women have tried that one? Come on. And even if she was, is that really a testament to Jesus? Maybe Mary was exceptionally fertile. Maybe she got hammered one night at a frat party. Who knows?

Regardless of birthright, the Easter Bunny is a giant rabbit carrying around a magic basket. No confusion on who he is. Jesus had to tell you who he was. Even if you don't know the Easter Bunny you would be in awe if you saw him. Or terrified. Jesus was an average guy with dirty feet. So on the first impression scale the Easter Bunny wins hands down.

When it comes to miracles Jesus was impressive but Jesus didn't have to contend with billions of children. In one day the Easter Bunny manages to deliver eggs, gifts and goodies to children all around the world. Jesus did his thing in an area not much larger than Massachusetts. More important is the fact that the Easter Bunny is still performing his miracle every year. Jesus has been laying low for a while. Points go to the bunny.

As for the lessons they teach I have to call it a draw. Jesus told people to treat others the way you would like to be treated. Even though some do bad things and justify it by saying they'd like to be treated that way, most people don't dodge this issue with semantics. Jesus had some good ideas. But so does the Easter Bunny. If anything the Easter Bunny might be more effective in encouraging people to behave responsibly because you don't get any gifts if you're bad. Only good boys and girls get a basket from the Easter Bunny. If you're bad that giant bunny will eat your hostas. I've seen evidence of that.

The thing that troubles me about Jesus is that I think he might have been a vampire. He told the apostles that they could enjoy eternal life if they drank his blood and ate his flesh. That's pretty gross. I've been told that this is a metaphor, but if you go to church and take communion you drink wine and eat a piece of a wafer that supposedly represents the flesh and blood of Jesus. That's just weird. The term communion in itself is just creepy. Aside from church the only time you hear that word used is in movies where the planet is being invaded by alien pod people. And the way people commune in churches is eerily similar to the way they commune in movies. Like their minds are being controlled by a slimy brain leech from another world.

The Easter Bunny doesn't ask you to eat him. Which is a shame because bunnies are tasty. They taste like chicken. Now a giant bunny who is thousands of years old and travels around the world would be a little tough, but a slow simmer would yield a tasty stew. Throw in some carrots and some garlic and you've got a great dinner. It's not weird or gross. People eat bunnies all the time. I would not try to take down a bunny the size of a Kodiak bear but he would be yummy if one was so inclined.

Having eaten the Jesus wafer I can tell you that he is not a very tasty savior. He's dry and bland. They really could use a little Ecumenical cheese or at least a little disciple butter. Sometimes I think that cheaper churches cut costs by breaking off little chunks of styrofoam and I know that they water down the wine. Some churches use grape juice... and not a brand name either. I've seen many a jug of cheap grape drink in the church dumpster on Monday morning. Did Jesus have high fructose corn syrup coursing through his veins?

When it comes to eating your messiah, the bunny wins. You see, the bunny never told anybody to eat him, which makes his love unconditional...as long as you're good. Jesus wanted people to eat him. Which makes me wonder if he was being literal, or simply expressing his frustration with the people he was talking to. I've told quite a few people to eat me (or at least certain parts) but I didn't mean it.

If you do eat the bunny you are rewarded with a delicious meal that sticks to your ribs. With Jesus you get a stale cracker that has no taste and a little half-shot of a mystery beverage that doesn't quite wash it down. In some Catholic masses they actually drink out of the same goblet. With herpes and mad cow disease running around out there I think I'd rather enjoy my Jesus in a plastic shot glass, if you don't mind.

When you break it down the Easter Bunny is the better deity by a long shot. He's more impressive, more powerful and more interactive than Jesus. If Jesus would take the time to deliver gifts to people around the world once a year, he'd have a shot. At passing Santa Claus. Yeah, that's right, Santa Claus. We didn't compare him to Jesus today, but if we're being honest Santa holds a narrow edge over Jesus. I don't think either of them has a chance of passing the Easter Bunny. Santa tries by giving more gifts, but everybody knows that his exploitation of wildlife and guest workers is what makes him the commodity he is. Besides, that fat SOB not only demands good behavior in exchange for gifts, he wants cookies left out at every house. No wonder he's such a fat hog in spite of being so allegedly busy. But at least he delivers gifts! Jesus is still telling people to eat him 2000 years later.

Sharon Stone's Vagina

2006-04-05T13:10:00.000-07:00

After almost 15 years, Sharon Stone's vagina has come back to reclaim the career that Sharon Stone herself derailed. Basic Instinct was a steamy pseudo-thriller that stunned audiences with it's graphic content. Actually, it wasn't the graphic content that stunned audiences so much as the hype that promised us stunning graphic content. What was actually released was a watered down version of soft core porn. The best part of the whole movie was Wayne Knight lecherously gobbling up Sharon Stone with his beady little eyes. That was the best acting in the whole movie. Newman!

Aside from Knight, the acting wasn't even that good. Stone and Douglas were over the top and the bit players desperately mugged for the camera in hopes that audiences might remember that they were in the movie too. The plot was as thin as something Ron Jeremy might have starred in. Sadly, nobody in Basic Instinct had the talent or charisma of Ron Jeremy. If it hadn't been for all the hype, nobody would have watched.

Even so, Basic Instinct gave us 14 years of Sharon Stone who played the vixen a few more times before people realized she wasn't exceptionally talented and moved on. Didn't she start to look a little too much like Hilary Clinton? For a while, anyway. After a string of forgettable movie parts and embarrassing television appearances, Stone took a look in the mirror and realized that cosmetic surgery wasn't doing what it used to and that she had one last chance to cash in on her looks. Either that or it was doing some cheesy movies on Lifetime.

Enter Basic Instinct 2. The movie opened to less than stellar reviews and limited box office interest. Perhaps people didn't buy the hype this time around. Why would they? Back in 1992 audiences were led to believe that the sex in Basic Instinct was going to leave people gasping for air, what it did was leave the entire country with a case of blue balls. We got all worked up for the sex we were promised and got a slowly paced attempt at a thriller with way too much of Michael Douglas' butt.

Sharon has hit the interview circuit talking about how she insisted they put in steamy sex scenes. Apparently she realizes that her big mistake since Basic Instinct was trying to be a real actress. By the way, I read some article that said Sharon Stone's IQ tested over 150. Can that be right? Because on this press tour she's been on she seems a little stupid. Was that score really an SAT result? I'm not kidding, the woman sounds like Butthead in every interview. She just giggles and says the dumbest things.

It's quite clear that this is an aging starlet's last grasp at her sexual vitality. She's getting older and her fame is dwindling. Stone has even hinted that this film is much deeper than people realize. She has tried to pawn it off as some sort of rally cry for Hollywood to realize that older women are still sexy.

Of course they are, Sharon. Especially when they have spent millions of dollars on the best cosmetic surgery in the world. Plastic Surgeons around Hollywood are less like doctors and more like meat cutters trimming hunks of flabby skin off the slabs of celebrity meat on their tables. News flash, to Ms. Stone: You're actually part of the problem. When you go to great lengths to look 29 again, the only point you prove is that there really is no room for 50 year-old women on the big screen. At least not playing a femme fatale.

Shame on Sharon Stone for pretending that BI2 is about anything other than her pay day. She found herself on the A-list when she spread her legs in Basic Instinct, so logic would dictate that doing it again 14 years later would get her back into prominence. At least back on the B-list.

But she's wrong. Nobody wants to see her vagina anymore. Vaginas just don't change that much and if they do it's typically not for the better. It's not mean, it's the truth. We've seen Sharon's goodies. That's why actresses who rely heavily on their looks don't last long. Once you see what they've got, you lose interest. It's like reading a mystery. Once you finish the book, it's just not the same if you go back and read it again. Jessica Alba would be wise to take note.

And it's not fair. It's ridiculous that Harrison Ford can still play the leading man at 64 while Virginia Madsen has to play his house Frau at 20 years his junior. Or how about Kevin Spacey casting 20 year-old Kate Bosworth as his love interest in Beyond the Sea? He's older than her dad! It's preposterous that Hollywood will try to pass septuagenarian actors off as forty-something and then pair them with a love interest who just turned 21. What about the women? Karen Allen was good enough to play Harrison Ford's love interest when she was 30. Why can't she play his wife now? She's still 10 years younger than he is. Totally unfair.

But honestly, women do it to themselves. Seriously. Read the polls. Women still find Harrison Ford, Sean Connery and Robert Redford sexy. Paul Newman's closing in on 90 and women will still give him credit for being hot. Who's sick?

And men aren't really as picky as you think. Honestly, I think women find older actresses in romantic leads objectionable. Men usually want to skip the romantic scenes and the gratuitous sex so they can watch the special effects and artfully crafted violence. I think it's the female viewers who cringe at a mature actress playing the damsel in distress. Men take what they can get. Did you see American Pie? MILF? Says it all.

Besides, men are pigs. We get our skin from real pornography. We don't need to watch some almost-rated-nc17 movie to get our jollies. We can go online or grab a Hustler from the local magazine rack and get hard core porn to satisfy our need for visual sex. No. The mainstream movies are for women. Sharon Stone isn't baring her vagina for the men of the world, she's doing it for all the ladies. And the money.

American Sheeple...

2006-03-30T05:44:00.000-08:00

I can't believe how easily distracted Americans are. I live here and work here and realize that Americans are inherently lazy and generally stupid, but even I am stunned by how easily manipulated the American public has become. For nearly six years our country has been struggling to recover from terrorist attacks. Regardless of which political camp you come from, the fact is clear that America is in trouble.

The president is suffering from a staggering lack of public support. The war in Iraq has not gone as planned and the reasons for invading Iraq have become increasingly unclear. Fuel prices are high, wages are down and national debt is spiraling out of control. Republicans running for office in November have distanced themselves from the Bush administration and many self-described conservatives have taken the very public position of declaring Bush a liberal Strong words in today's political arena, where a politician would rather be called a child molester, drug addict or even a conspirator. Anything but the "L" word.

So it would stand to reason that this November's election would revolve around fiscal responsibility, a definitive exit strategy for Iraq and a new foreign policy that would restore our country to its former position of benevolent global constable instead of maintaining our current status as self-righteous international bully.

That's not the case. This November the touchstone issue will be immigration. Somehow this issue, which has been smoldering on the back burner of partisan politics for decades, has suddenly become a hot button topic. It covers all of the meaningful bases: Jobs, budget, and national security; while it relegates both parties to their core constituencies.

In the border states, Republicans will play to hard-working white Americans who are besieged with brown-skinned people speaking a foreign language. Democrats will reach out to the immigrants and promise to work hard to make the pursuit of the American Dream a little easier. In short, both parties will play the race card.

In the working class states the Democrats will go on the offensive against the guest worker provisions in the bill rallying unions and blue collar workers to the cause of protecting American jobs and benefits. The Republicans will cater to the business owners and champion their cause of securing low cost labor that will allow businesses to remain profitably competitive. In other words it's all about the money.

Some mavericks will surely dig into the meatier issues such as the war on terror, the national debt and the heavy handed national security measures employed by the Bush administration, but they will largely be ignored by the rest of the partisan hopefuls looking for a good clean fight over a topic that both parties will happily ignore once elected. Nobody wants to make this election about something that can come back to haunt them in two years. Immigration is that shiny new toy that the kids fight over for a few hours before realizing that the box it came in is a little more interesting. By the end of November, immigration will be forgotten and everybody will go back to sparring over partisan politics while they feel out the platform for the next big election.

Isn't it ironic that in an era where this country is so bitterly divided over such critical issues, the ruling parties can find common ground and work together to continue to deceive the people? America truly is a great place.

For politicians.

Dr. Coulter, venom woman.

2006-03-20T06:48:00.000-08:00

My name is Steve Croyle and I'm a liberal.

I never expected it to go this far, but I look in the mirror and I just don't recognize the guy in looking back at me. I guess it started in high school. I befriended a couple of black guys. It wasn't like I was hooked or anything. We only hung out on the weekends and before I knew it I was listening to Public Enemy on headphones in my room, but that's as bad as it got. I mean, I think I might have had a gay friend, but we never did anything together and he didn't tell me he was gay. It's just looking back I think it was obvious. Excuse me, but pegged jeans are so 1985.

Sure, I hugged my share of trees every now and then, but what self-respecting kid doesn't? It's not like I was eating granola! Although I did enjoy the occasional bowl of Grape Nuts. I had a Nature Valley bar once, but I don't think people should be held accountable for youthful indiscretions. Besides, I didn't really like it.

College is where things got out of hand. I got caught up in the "issues". First it was the environment, then it was affirmative action and I even formed an opinion on abortion. That being that I wasn't ready to have a kid or abstain. It was college, girls were putting out and I was 18. Most guys are pro-choice until they get married and then they are only pro-life if their wives get pregnant. Mistresses should always be allowed to choose not to have a child.

Still, it wasn't that bad. Yes, I openly associated with admitted homosexuals and several blacks who were taking full advantage of affirmative action by accepting minority scholarship money, but I still hadn't strayed too far. Everybody experiments, right?

Then I changed my major and took journalism classes. That's where I think things spiraled out of control. We used to close the door to the mass media center and mainline the first amendment until we were giddy. The professors supplied all of the copies of the Constitution we needed and seemed delighted when we got all hopped up on ideals. They pushed their free expression dope on us and we were their junkies. They encouraged us to think for ourselves and question everything, even the government. Even Operation Desert Storm!

I got hooked on liberty and questioned authority at every turn. I didn't want to play the game by somebody else's rules. I was a squeaky wheel, a whistle blower, a square peg. I couldn't even see the writing on the wall when I was fired for challenging an employer's discriminatory HR practices. I was blinded by my own bleeding heart. Letters and essays piled up. I raged against machines I was powerless to stop. I bought organic vegetables. I donated money to Moveon.org and I even considered joining the Green Party. I actually voted for Ralph Nader. Twice! Still, I couldn't see the evil of my ways.

It wasn't until I finally decided to focus on a book that I saw myself for what I was: An America-hating pinko communist. It was the rational writing style of sage columnists such as Ann Coulter and political commentator Bill O'Reilly who enlightened me to the error of my ways. Now I realize the terrible damage I have done to myself, my family and my country by embracing such heinous concepts as civil rights, environmental protection, social services and mutual cultural respect. How sick!

Liberals are destroying America with their sinister compassion and diabolical sensitivity. Issues like women's rights and racial equality have turned this country into a septic pit of moral corruption and hopeless depravity. Tax codes that require the wealthiest people to shoulder a reasonable burden of responsibility for the country's long term success have crushed the American Dream of benevolent monopolies that control prices and ease the minds of consumers by eliminating choice. And unions, that relentlessly empower workers with the ability to consolidate their influence in order to negotiate better pay and benefits, have reduced our workforce to a mindless hoard of gluttonous pigs devouring the resources of our country's major corporations. There are CEO's out there who haven't seen a seven figure Christmas bonus yet... and it's 2006! And for what? Family medical coverage? Liberals passed child labor laws years ago, but the unions still want to cut Jr. in on medical coverage. How American is that? If the family wants medical insurance, the family should earn it.

And they won't stop there. Liberals want this country to find an alternative to fossil fuels which would force Americans to drive zero emissions vehicles and ultimately rob thousands of the rewarding (and safe) careers offered by companies that drill for oil and mine coal. Some liberals even want to legalize industrial hemp which would reduce our consumption of lumber and force manly lumber jacks to trade in their chain saws for pruning shears. Imagine that. A world full of paper made from a plant that only takes a few months to grow. Ridiculous.

And free healthcare! Please. What possible purpose could that serve? If everybody has access to the best medical care available, what advantage would the wealthy have? None. The lord works in mysterious ways, if he wants to poor to die that's his call. We shouldn't question.

I only hope it's not too late for me to undo the damage I have done. There is no telling how many children I have turned gay, or how many of the terrorists I was directly responsible for letting in to this country. I only know that I have done America a grave disservice by being a liberal and now I will spend the rest of my life trying to right those wrongs. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to order some NASCAR tickets.

And you thought Utah was bad?

2006-03-13T12:17:00.000-08:00

We mock Utah. It's got a reputation for being a bit, umm, Mormon. Those who haven't been to Utah get the distinct impression that the Osmond family patrols the streets of Utah looking to bring swift Mormon justice to anybody who might be having fun. This is not true. Not entirely anyway. Only half of the Osmond family patrols the streets looking for wayward heathens.

Compared to neighboring Nevada, where prostitution is legal, Utah is a puritanical empire but so is California when held up to that standard of liberty. Yeah, Utah's endured some pretty aggressive overtures from religious zealots but over all it's pretty laid back. Believe me when I tell you that great snow notwithstanding, skiers and snowboarders would not make Utah a destination if the authorities cracked down as much as people think they do.

Utah might not be as progressive as some states, but at least they aren't regressing. Like Ohio. Yes, Ohio is leading the way back to the days of Indian wars and slave auctions. It seems as though Ohio doesn't like what the future holds so the whole state is running back to the turn of the century. The 18th century.

In 2004 Ohio passed a so-called defense of marriage act. Apparently marriage was under attack and needed legislation passed to protect it from people who wanted to get married. I still don't understand how gay people getting married has any impact on straight people getting married but to many Ohioans this issue was of critical importance. More than toxic sediment in Lake Erie; more than corruption in the governor's office. Homosexuals posed the biggest threat to families in Ohio.

Granted, other states passed similar legislation. Even Oregon, the liberal stronghold, passed these gay marriage bans. Although it in Oregon's case you have to wonder if homosexuals secretly supported the ban so that contractual option would remain a moot point. Nobody ever accused a homosexual of being stupid. Prissy? Sure, but stupid? No.

Ohio's ban went a step beyond simply making it illegal for gays to marry. The language in the amendment is written so as to render common law marriages and domestic partnerships legally invalid. So not only did they limit who could get married, they made all other relationships worthless in the eyes of the law. So you've been living together as domestic partners for 30 years? Too bad. You're not family so you'll have to leave the ICU. Very nice. Oh yes, it's that specific. In a medical emergency the state will have the authority to make decisions over your partner. Take that you queers! Oh, and everybody else.

Nevermind the fact that there are some people who aren't religious and don't believe in marital contracts. Many of these people are heterosexual (not that this should matter) and maintain more successful and enduring monogamous relationships than their married peers. Ohio's law punishes them.

Now, with another election coming up, legislators are drafting another moral agenda bill. This time the issue is contraception and whether or not medical professionals have a right to refuse to dispense it. The talking points supporting this bill center on RU486 or Plan B, which is the pill a woman takes immediately after sex to prevent the development of a fertilized egg, but it the language of the bill also allows doctors and pharmacists, who are licensed by the state, to refuse to distribute any contraception.

This is not about personal choice. This is about suspending subjective religious beliefs when you perform your duties as a licensed medical professional. Where do you draw the line? Sure, one doctor might not want to prescribe RU486, but what happens when you need a blood transfusion? What if that doctor believes that treatment is morally objectionable?

That's why I think Ohio's new state anthem should be rewritten. I have submitted the following lyrics to be sung to the tune of Bowling for Soup's 1985:

Ohio just hit the wall
we're watching freedom fall
taking evolution away
won't let you marry gay
Bill of Rights went out the door
back in 2004
gave our money to one man
and a coin investment plan

We were going to make some progress
shake up history
we were going to change the world
and clean up Lake Erie
but now the Jesus freaks are controlling me
they took my normal life
and drove me back in time, to:

(chorus)
Indentured servants, burnt witches
and knickers were your britches,
we had baked beans, and toiling
there was no time for enjoying
went to service on Sunday
they'd stone you if you went astray
because things were so cool in 16, 16, 1692.

Those people had it made
it was a simple way
follow the word of god
or they made you pay
women were just like cows
who took marriage vows
you had to obey your spouse
it wasn't a thing like now.

Where's that burning smell in Salem,
and when did TV become the devil's new haven
when did liberty become objective
whatever happened to fire and brimstone
(and no radio)

(chorus)

And the Oscar goes to...HUBRIS!

2006-03-06T08:05:00.000-08:00

What a glorious year for Oscar. This year every movie nominated made a statement. This was an Academy Awards night that made everybody in Hollywood feel good about patting themselves on the back. Even Jack Nicholson, who appeared drunk when he presented the award for best picture, can bask in the glow of self-righteousness. You've all earned it. Good day at the office.

Never mind that I don't want to see any of these movies. Look, I'm not some conservative Christian who thinks that watching Brokeback Mountain will force me to reconsider my choice to be heterosexual, I just don't like romance movies. Brokeback Mountain is a chick flick with no chicks. Eventually I'll see it when it shows up on Starz but I don't pay good money to see anybody kiss. Not without an "X" rating anyway.

I'm surprised that Heath Ledger didn't stand up and scream when Best Picture went to Crash. Frankly, I'm surprised Spike Lee didn't do the same. Surely Heath was thinking about Oscar the whole time he sucked face with Jake Gyllenhall. Why else would you do that? His heart probably sank when that fat pig Phillip Seymour Hoffman, who played a gay guy not involved in a love scene, waddled up to take the Best Actor trophy, but he held it in because he might have taken one for the team. Best Picture was the payoff, right? besides, Russell Crowe kind of screwed things up for Australians acting surly. Can't embody a stereotype right? And that stocky jerk isn't even Austrialian! He's from New Zealand. Where does he get off? When Jack opened the envelope and read Crash, Ledger must have been ready to kill somebody. WHAT? ARE YOU KIDDING ME? I KISSED A FREAKING DUDE!!! A DUDE!!! GIVE ME MY OSCAR, YOU SCHEMING BASTARDS!!!! Good job on keeping cool. Give the kid an Oscar for class.

Spike Lee had to be stark raving mad because Crash was only every movie he ever made. It was like Do the Right Thing without Rosie Perez. Where's his Oscar? A couple of white folks rehash his genre and you can't wait to honor them, but let a brotha make a movie and it gets snubbed. OK. I admit I didn't see Crash, but through the previews I was able to get the gist of the movie and I took the liberty of jumping to conclusions. Besides, how good could the movie be? Matt Dillon was in it.

Ironically, Crash was a movie about racism and prejudice, but didn't Hollywood put on one of the whitest Academy Awards ceremonies in recent memory? Sure, they gave 3-6 Mafia an Oscar for best song, but didn't that have TOKEN written all over it? Yeah, I know a couple of years ago Halle Berry and Denzel Washington claimed Oscars for best actress and actor respectively, but anybody who endures a sex scene with Billy Bob deserves something for their trouble and Denzel's wasn't an award for his over-the-top performance in Training Day, it was a payback for screwing him out of the nod for his performance in Malcolm X (Spike Lee, again). Still doesn't make up for snubbing The Color Purple now does it?

It was obvious this year's awards were carefully considered. Normally you've got one good movie amidst a bunch of garbage but this year there were so many heady offerings. Everybody had to be honored.

Best Picture went to Crash because of it's prolific use of black characters and poignant social commentary. It was a life lesson with beautiful people. An after school special with talented performers. A humanities class you pay $7.50 to see. Brokeback Mountain edged itself out of the running because one of the male leads was not black. Had Ang Lee opted to throw race into the mix with the homosexuality, the movie would have swept every important award. As such he fell short.

Best Director was Ang Lee. Partly because people like saying his name but mostly because his father died recently. Nothing spells gold like giving a Hollywood insider a chance to dedicate an Oscar to his dearly departed.

Best Actor: The portly Phillip Seymour Hoffman. It's likely people simply got confused and thought he was actually Dustin Hoffman who is due for one of those lifetime achievement nods they hand out periodically. They tried to sneak one of those in for the brutally aged Judi Dench, but the sympathy votes were split between her and Felicity Huffman and that opened the door for perpetually perky Reese Witherspoon to win Best Actress for what had to be an easy roll in Walk the Line. Does anybody know anything about June Carter other than the fact that she was married to Johnny Cash? Of course not, so how hard could it be to get into character? Cop a southern accent and yell a lot. Easy.

For the record, Felicity Huffman would have wonthe award if she wasn't a regular on a current television show. The Silver Screen bluebloods don't take kindly to those who make a living on the small screen. Playing ugly always scores points (Just ask Charlize Theron) and Huffman worked the freakshow in Transamerica, but it wasn't enough to overcome Desperate Housewives. But she gets to see Eva Longoria naked backstage so there's a trade off.
I'd take a steady paying gig and access to naked Eva over a golden statue anyday.

Do you like how I tied those two categories together? Efficient, wasn't it. Too bad The Academy can't do the same, eh? Do we really need three and a half hours of blah?

Supporting Actor went to George Clooney for his work in Good Night and Good Luck, which was artfully filmed in black and white. Yes, Syrianna was the film he was nominated for, but that's just a technicality. He won for directing Good Night and Good Luck. Nobody watched Syrianna. I don't even know if I'm spelling it right and I'm not going to check because I know that nobody will catch it if it's wrong. Hollywood simply can't ignore a film that reminds everybody that Joe McCarthy tried to destroy everything the Academy stands for.

Supporting Actress went to Rachel Weisz of Mummy fame. Apparently she's a good actress but you wouldn't have known it watching The Constant Gardener which was really a Ralph Fiennes vehicle. She was in the movie featured in flashback sequences that actually made the film hard to watch (You see, I actually watched this one! I was tricked by the DVD jacket and a couple of previews that made me think it was exciting. It wasn't.) Here's the rub: She was nominated for Supporting Actress which leads one to believe that some other actress had a more prominent role in the movie, right? Well that's not true. She was the lead actress but she gets killed early and the whole movie is about her husband trying to figure out what happened. It wasn't the cyanide pill that English Patient turned out to be, but it still left something to be desired.

Why did she win? My guess is that The Academy doesn't like the rest of the nominees. Frances McDormand already got an undeserved Oscar for Fargo and Catherine Keener made the mistake of starring opposite Steve Carrell in The 40 year-old Virgin. She's officially blacklisted for that one. Worse than being on TV. The other nominees weren't important enough to garner Academy love, so Weisz won by default. Besides, she English so that kind of makes up for Dench not winning her "Boy, is she still acting" award.

Here's a category that confuses me: Screenplay. They have two. Adapted Screenplay means that somebody took the idea from a book and created a movie script. Original Screenplay is when somebody makes a movie from scratch. It's just a nifty little way Hollywood honors both writers and plagiarists.The Movie business has a long tradition of lacking orginality. Remeber Deep Impact and Armageddon were released in the same year? Tombstone and Wyatt Earp battled for box office love. Not much going on in the creativity department. Brokeback won for adapted screen play, while Crash won the award for being original, or as original as you can be when you steal Spike Lee's career. It's really not that important because the big award is Best Picture. That's the pinnacle. Nobody except the writers care about the screenplay nods. That's why they start pushing the wrters off the stage as soon as they get their hands on Oscar. You got your trophy now go home!

It's the redundancy of the awards that is interesting. What does it say about a director when a movie wins best Picture but he doesn't get Best Director? You'd think that was the end of the road. That's got to be the biggest slap in the face. The Academy just lauded every aspect of the movie you directed but snubbed you. It's like saying that the movie was great in spite of you.

And what does it say about the cast and crew if a movie gets the Oscar for Screenplay but failed to take home best picture? Isn't that a coulda woulda shoulda award? Does that mean Brokeback Mountain would have swept the awards if Phillip Seymour Hoffman had been the lead over heath Ledger? How would Jake Gyllenhall felt about smooching the pudgy PSH?
Yuck.

When you think about it that way, you have to pin the blame of Brokeback's failure on the cast. Ang Lee won for Best Director. The plagiarists...I mean writers...won for best adapted Screenplay. Nobody from Crash won any acting awards so the difference had to be Ledger and Gyllenhall. They must have squandered the brilliant direction of Ang Lee and the careful adaptation of the writers.( Notice how I, a writer, refuse to give them their props? It's because I have no idea who they are. I think Larry McMurtry helped out but that's all I know.) How else do you explain it? Unless the whole thing is a premeditated sham. HMMM.

Anna earned that money...

2006-02-28T07:02:00.000-08:00

Anna Nicole Smith appeared before the Supreme Court this morning but the hearing was postponed when four of the justices experienced heart palpatations while the vivacious celebrity stood up to be sworn in.

The matter at hand is the estate of J. Howard Marshall, the 89 year-old billionaire Anna Nicole married back in 1994. Marshall died after one year of marriage that included lavishing the buxom star with expensive gifts. When the old coot finally died, Anna contended that she was entitled to half of his 1.6 billion dollar estate. Marshall's surviving family disputed that assertion and a long battle ensued. Marshall's son, Pierce managed to convince state courts that he was the only heir to the estate, but Smith's pursuit of the matter in federal court revealed that Pierce destroyed evidence and altered paperwork that might have given credence to Smith's case. Smith was awarded nearly 500 million by the federal court, but an appeal by the Marshall family has moved the case forward. The Supreme Court will decide whether or not the federal courts have jurisdiction in this matter.

I say Anna Nicole deserves half of the estate. Unless she signed a prenup that specifically excluded her from the estate, which is a fact not in evidence, by virtue of marriage she deserves a significant portion of Marshall's money. Marshall knew that when he married her.

Is Anna a gold-digging opportunist? Hell yeah. She married that old codger because he had big money and he knew that was exactly what she saw in him. He was a shriveled up old man who was on death's door and he got to live out a dream by marrying a woman who was the hottest sexpot on the planet at that time. That last year might have been the best year of his life.

Was he of sound mind? Sure he was. Marshall's move was calculated. For his entire adult life he sacrificed everything to make money. He worked long hours, greased political wheels and supported his family. When he took that last look back over his life he realized that he couldn't take anything with him and all of that wealth was going to end up in the money grubbing clutches of his son who didn't do anything except hit daddy up for money. Why not go out with a bang?

The only sad part of this story is that society expects Anna Nicole to pretend that she loved the old bastard. That was never part of the arrangement. Marshall wanted his own private stripper on hand for his few remaining years and Anna Nicole was happy to oblige. The poor girl worked her way up through seedy Texas strip clubs. How hard would it be to give some rich old coot a lap dance once a week?

What I'm saying is that the exploitation was mutual. Texas courts lashed out at Anna Nicole because they chose to see her as a ruthless woman using sex to con a confused old man out of his money. It's easy to project the image of your senile grandfather on to Marshall, but what if Marshall wasn't senile? What if he was just horny? What if your grandfather just wanted a little action before he died?

Is sex with Anna Nicole worth 500 million? Probably not, but Marshall got more than sex, he also landed himself a trophy that he could lord over the rest of the world. Look at this, everybody! It's all mine. Anna Nicole Smith was more than just a sexy stripper, she was an A-list celebrity. She could have had any guy she wanted and she wanted J. Howard Marshall. He knew his money had a lot to do with it, but by the time he turned 89 was there really a distinction? More than anything Anna Nicole Smith was Marshall's way of letting the world know that he won the game. He traded in his wealth for that vicarious vitality Anna Nicole provided. He died a happy man. Good for him.

And good for her. You don't have to respect her. You don't have to like her. Anna Nicole made a name for herself with a great body and not much else. She's not going to cure cancer and she isn't going to write a classic novel. Anna Nicole has tried her hand at acting and come away looking a bit foolish. But that doesn't mean she's stupid. There are plenty of sexy women out there who never rise above shaking their breasts at a the local strip club and the handful of people who stumble into their 15 minutes of fame typically fail to capitalize. Anna Nicole didn't miss any opportunities. She used her body to become famous and used her fame to attract the attention of a man who could set her up for life. How stupid is that?

Pierce Howard is upset because Anna Nicole Smith came between him and his daddy's money. Pierce was counting on that windfall. He had his sights set on that estate from the time he could count. Imagine his frustration when his dad took a shine to Anna Nicole Smith. Imagine his outrage when she reciprocated. Pierce needs to back off. If his father wasn't of sound mind he could have stopped the wedding. He could have acquired durable power of attorney over his father's estate and kept Anna Nicole out of the picture. But he couldn't do that. His dad was just fine. Old, but otherwise fine. J. Howard Marshall simply decided that he had done right by his family and was going to use the power of his estate to do right by himself. One last piece of candy before bed. Nothing wrong with that.

These things happen all the time. Old men marry young women who subsequently lay claim to the estate. The reason people have a problem with Anna Nicole is because she made a name for herself selling sex. It's obvious that she's not a brilliant conversationalist and that makes the reason Marshall married her even more obvious. The glaring truth in this case is what upsets people. Society prefers a these matters to be subtle. There's nothing subtle about Anna Nicole. She's big, busty and loud. We know that she didn't win J. Howard Marshall's heart, she stirred his loins and for that he was willing to trade his wealth.

What people don't realize is that Anna Nicole traded more than temporary use of her body for all of that money. She became a bit of a pariah when she married Marshall and her career fell flat. Sure, that collapse was inevitable, but the marriage expedited things. People started to hate her after she married that old man.

Now she's a punch line. We mock her because she's always drunk or high or both. We laugh because we assume she's playing along, but the reality is that this experience has hurt her. She wasn't well equipped to handle the pressure of being famous when everybody loved her, now everybody loves to hate her. Sadly, that probably wasn't something she bargained for when she married Marshall.

Anna Nicole married Marshall because she realized that her time in the spotlight was coming to an end. She didn't have enough substance to maintain a meaningful career and the infatuation with her body would eventually subside and she would be replaced with the next hard body to stun the Playboy Audience. When Marshall made himself available, she did the math and figured it was the best investment she could make. Chances are pretty good that Marshall himself spelled that reality out for her. Neither of them realized how quickly the public would turn on her.

Call her what you will, but give the girl her money. She earned it. J. Howard Marshall wanted her to have it. It was a business proposition. He bought her life with his massive fortune. Who are we to judge?

Last night I spent the evening....

2006-02-22T06:38:00.000-08:00

I feel dirty. Last night I found myself glued to the television oogling young girls in revealing outfits doing their level best to gain approval from unscrupulous judges and an adoring audience. These girls pushed themselves to the limits of their abilities while I sat there like some dirty old man feeling them up with my eyes.

Sadly, the event I watched was American Idol. Fox was brash in opting to run American Idol against the Olympics, especially with figure skating on the playlist but they took the gamble and it worked. Traditionally the other networks will impose a hiatus on their new shows and run movies or reruns opposite the games. Fox broke form and challenged the Olympics by running its powerhouse Idol against NBC's extensive coverage in a high stakes game of ratings chicken.

The bread and butter for the Olympics is women's figure skating. It's been a ratings machine over the years thanks in large part to the fact that it is artistic enough to appeal to women and men love the skin factor. Oh, we're supposed to put up a fight and the NBA always gives us a chip we can play, but in our perverted little hearts we love the Olympics because it's soft core porn. While our wives and girlfriends marvel at the athletic and artistic ability of the skaters, we men are waiting for the spins that will send that tiny little skirt into the air and give us a peek at rock hard butt cheeks. Sick isn't it? Not nearly as sick as the photo spreads in FHM, Gear and Maxim will be in the coming months. And you can bet somebody (Tanith Belbin) (Please) will accept a two million dollar pay day from Playboy to bare all to the world.

But this time around I watched American Idol, a show I really don't like. I think the talent is often overrated and the selection process doesn't help ensure that the best singer reaches the finals. It's a popularity contests where prepubescent girls have the greatest influence over the final outcome. Making the show even more annoying is Paula Abdul who seems to think that everybody has talent. This might be because she has none and enjoyed musical success anyway. You go, Laker Girl.

Randy Jackson is almost as annoying. If he stood up during every song and flailed his arms around like some drunk groupie at a Poison concert the way Paula does he would be her equal, but Randy's crime is his failure to find a thesaurus. Everybody's a dude and Yo, dog, I just wasn't feelin it. That is, of course, unless that was hype, dog. And that whole dog pound thing? Two words: Played Out. That whole thing was tired after the third airing of the Arsenio Hall show. Got to go. By the way, has anybody else noticed that Randy looks like a frog? Kermit's brother from another mother. It's Diggem! Ribbit.

The only redeeming aspect of the show is Simon who will tell it like it is. He gets slammed for being mean, but he's always speaking the truth and that industry is brutal. If the contestants can't handle Simon's barbs they'll be slitting their wrists after a Broadway audition. Yes, it does matter if you're fat, ugly and don't know how to dress. Why do you think Roseanne's singing career went down the tubes? Why do you think pop tarts like Britney Spears and her predecessor Paula Abdul had careers? T and A, baby.

But this isn't about AI. What happened to the Olympic Games? How can an overblown Star Search retread go head to head with the Olympics and win? Why was I sitting there listening to the American Idol contestants read their carefully edited biographies while the Olympics were taking place on NBC?

That answer was revealed when I switched to NBC after the American Idol segment mercifully ended. I tuned into the middle of the women's figure skating telecast and suffered through the boring classical music and hum drum routines. The reason we don't care about the Olympics is because we have seen them before. Sure, Peggy Flemming couldn't land a triple flip, but aside from an extra rotation in the jumps, things haven't progressed in the presentation of the show for 30 years. Same old stodgy crap. To quote Homer Simpson: BORING!

There's too much focus on artistic impression and the skaters are confined to restrictive programs that don't allow the better athletes an opportunity to really shine. In exhibitions skaters are landing backflips and performing to high energy music that gets the crowd excited but in the scored events the judges insist on traditional routines and we are subjected to a series of uninspired performances that all bleed into one. There's no wow factor. The winner is usually the person who makes the fewest mistakes. If you turn the skaters loose and reward them for pushing the envelop the way they do in the halfpipe fans might be inclined to watch. They make the same mistake in gymnastics during the summer games. Rock and Roll has been a part of international culture for over 50 years but it's still forbidden in the Olympics. Why? To most of the participants Rock is the only form of music.

If these judges would listen to Rock they might have been able to take Bob Dylan's sage advice: The Times They are a Changing. We have 40 year-old white people listening to rap. How can you expect the audience to be turned on by skating performances being performed to stale orchestral music that was written 80 years ago? Hey, Chopin was a great composer and I'm sure he influenced countless musicians through the years, but I'll take your word for it. I'd rather see these skaters and ice dancers working out their routines to Black Eyed Peas or Kanye West. You know, I'd settle for Tom Tom Club if we have to compromise, but if I hear one more "aria" I'm going puke. This music was selected from the movie "The English Patient"...BLUGH!

And we have a winner in the pity party finals. This just in: Irina Slutskaya, the Russian skater, has a deathly ill mother and she is suffering her own chronic illness. Combine that with the fact that she's from Russia, which is always a sob story in itself, and you can warm the cockles of the hardest hearts. Dick Cheney doesn't count because we have already established he has no heart. You simply can't beat a top notch skater with vasculitis and a mother in need of a new kidney. Cue the violins, get a camera crew to Moscow. We need footage people! More misery! Why is that woman smiling? Where's the anguish? THE ANGUISH!

The American team had better come up with something fast, or the Russians will win it all. This is why Michelle Kwan pulled out. Strained groin my ass! Women don't even have groins, everybody knows that. Michelle found out the Irina has a chronic illness and knew that it would be impossible to beat her. That, and the fact the Michelle Kwan can't handle Olympic pressure.

But all is not lost. The Americans have a shot if they can capitalize on the fact that two of the women competing on our behalf are deformed. Look closely. Emily Hughes and Sasha Cohen have no chins. And Emily Hughes doesn't have lips! If Team USA wants a shot at Gold they'll have to play this angle to the hilt. Maybe somebody should kidnap Sasha's mom or inject Emily's sister Sarah with the dreaded bird flu virus. Something needs to be done to offset the dramatic edge Slutskaya has over the US team.

As for the ratings, NBC is screwed. They paid big money for long term broadcasting rights to the Olympics and Fox has proven that people will watch something else. Part of the problem is NBC's focus on melodrama, but some of the blame falls on the International Olympic committee for failing to develop games that are compelling to watch. Snowboard cross was a hit, but Alpine Skiing and Figure Skating are losing ground. Curling attracts a better audience than hockey and nobody watches Luge or Bobsled because there isn't enough potential for disaster. Every year people tune in hoping to see a sled fly out of the tube and crash into the stands, but it never happens. If the Jamaican team couldn't accomplish that in 1988 it's not going to happen.

NBC and the Olympic Committee have invested time and money into hyping certain athletes in hopes of drawing an audience. The problem is they lie about how good these athletes are. Bode Miller was marketed as a threat to win five gold medals, but nobody told us that Bode Miller is not internationally recognized as a top five skier. He could have won medals if the Austrian team got lost on the way to Turin. NBC pinned it's hopes on Michelle Kwan, even managing to manipulate the selection process to giver her an exemption in qualifying for the games, but Michelle decided she was not up to the task and she pulled out.

In previous Olympics NBC and the USOC hitched their wagons to charismatic stars who failed to deliver. Anybody remember Dan O'Brien? He was supposed to win the decathlon and failed miserably. And how about the 2004 Men's basketball team? Nice job there, eh? Fans get tired of the promises of things to come and we stop watching. Instead of marketing the American athletes so aggressively, why not market some of the foreign athletes as well? Leading into the games we heard about Apolo Anton Ohno and his short track hopes, but the real story was the Korean team. Why not promote the Korean team and market Ohno as an underdog? It's a little more interesting and a lot more accurate.

It should be very interesting to see how NBC responds to poor ratings. Heads should roll over this and there could be some pretty heated skirmishes between the International Olympic Committee and the executives at NBC. The IOC doesn't have much of a leg to stand on since they aren't attracting much international interest either. There are plenty of empty seats at every event and the city of Turin hasn't been overwhelmed with the revenue these games are generating. Couple that with the fact that NBC decided to change the name of their city from Turin to Torino and it's a bust all the way around.

Here lies Harry the shark, shot by a Dick and nobody narked.

2006-02-17T11:29:00.000-08:00

It's terrible that so many people are having such fun with something as serious as an accidental shooting. Where's the humanity? A man was shot in the face and suffered severe complications but does that prevent the witless pundits from taking shots? No. All's fair in the game of ratings and readership.

Ok, I can't keep a straight face. This is funny. Yes, it is. Don't give me this crap about a 78-year-old man spending a week in the ICU, he had it coming. Oh yes he did. Hanging around with Dick Cheney is dangerous enough, but hanging around Dick Cheney when Dick Cheney is armed is just asking for trouble. In case you've missed the last six years, our Vice President really lives up to his first name. If he's not hurling expletives at dissenting congressmen he's setting kittens on fire, punching Walmart greeters, or shooting neighborhood children with a pellet gun. We're talking about a guy who voted down Martin Luther King Day and voted no to a congressional resolution demanding the release of Nelson Mandela while passing legislation that allows companies to dump increased levels of toxins into water supplies. The reason the "D" is capitalized has nothing to do with proper nouns, Mr. Cheney is a penis with legs.

Dick Cheney flosses his teeth with electric eels and sleeps on broken glass. His medical history doesn't tell the tale of chronic heart trouble, it reveals that Dick Cheney has no heart. He is the manifestation of pure unadulterated evil and as if being loathsome wasn't enough, Cheney speaks out of the side of his mouth in a grotesque snarl that George Lucas couldn't bring himself to use when he created Chancellor Palpatine, because Lucas didn't want the evil emperor to be over-the-top. Dick Cheney had to pursue a career in politics because he makes children cry when he looks at them. He never smiles but rather simpers when bad things happen to good people. That's why our country has been embroiled in military conflict for the better part of six years. Dick likes it when people die.

There is no question in my mind that Dick Cheney shot Harry Whittington on purpose. All these years he's been sending people out to do the killing and he wanted a taste. He wanted to feel that trigger actuate when he had another human being in his sites. I know that's going out on a limb because it's impossible to prove, but I know he did it. Just like I know Michael Jackson molested those kids and John Goodman accidentally ate the first Becky on the set of Roseanne. Did you notice how much weight he gained during that series? It was almost like he packed on 100 pounds overnight wasn't it? Enter Sarah Chalke. Thank God D.J. didn't get to close to the craft services table.

The secrecy surrounding this shooting has everybody speculating as to what really happened. Some believe the delay in reporting the incident occurred because Cheney is having an affair with Pamela Willeford, who was one of the members of the hunting party but this doesn't make much sense. First of all, who would want to have an affair with Cheney? He's hideous. Maybe Cheney was blackmailing her for sexual favors but there's no way any woman in her right mind would willingly sleep with Dick Cheney. Insiders have reported that Cheney reeks of rotten potatoes, wet socks and Wild Turkey. Apparently the Skynyrd anthem "Ooh, that smell" was written after the band met with Dick Cheney before a live show back in 1970 when Cheney was dodging the draft.

It's quite clear that the reason Cheney didn't report the incident to authorities is because he was liquored up. This isn't surprising as it is customary to drink to excess before undertaking any recreational activity in Texas(I was once pulled over outside of Dallas for NOT having an open container), but since Whittington is a native Texan and Cheney is originally from Nebraska, Cheney would have been required to pay a $25 fine and revoke his hunting license for two weeks had alcohol been a factor in the shooting. Cheney didn't shoot exceptionally well, which is typical of somebody who always sends other off to do his dirty work, Whittington made a smug remark and Cheney popped a cap in his face. Probably went ghetto on him too. Who's the bad shot now, Harry?

Whittington's not going to fess up because Cheney can make one phone call and have everybody in Whittington's family detained in a secret prison somewhere in Europe. Cheney's probably taken that step already just to be on the safe side. In fact, that might be how the Bush Administration maintains its support a little proactive imprisonment keeps the wheels greased. If somebody balks at a Bush resolution, they get a loved one's pinky toe in the mail or the Bush administration sics a hurricane on their hometown. Cheney's idea.

Cheney and other members of the Bush administration have been to the Armstrong ranch before. In fact, the whole plan for invading Iraq was devised after a hunting trip to this ranch when one Bush staffer noted that it's a lot easier to hunt quail when you can wait for them to be released by the hundreds as opposed to having to flush them out one or two at a time. After struggling to track down real terrorists in Afghanistan, Bush and Cheney applied the logic learned at the Armstrong ranch to the war on terror and decided to pick a fight with Iraq. Unfortunately, they didn't factor in how much easier it is to shoot quail since the fat farm raised birds don't exactly put up much of a fight. For some reason, the terrorists being released from the Iraqi covey seem inclined to engage their hunters. It's pretty messy. And expensive.

We'll never get the whole story out of Cheney, but should we be surprised? This has been our administration for six years and they haven't been honest about anything from day one. 9-11? Can't talk about it. Mission Accomplished? Yes, of course it was. Gitmo? Classified. Weapons of Mass Destruction? Ha Ha. Wiretapping? Why are you worried?

It seems as though Whittington got off easy. Cheney only shot him in the face, the rest of us have been getting gang raped by the Bush administration every day for six years.

Celebrity Flakes....

2006-02-13T09:59:00.000-08:00

I don't make a point to seek out celebrity news. I have never purchased a tabloid, nor have I ever watched one of the tabloid gossip shows in its entirety. I'm attentive enough to know that Mark McGrath of Sugar Ray is now hosting one of those awful shows and former sportscaster Pat O'Brien eschewed a career covering March Madness to gab about the latest celebrity dirt.

I'm sure Sugar Ray is getting paid lots of money because he's cute and attracts a strong audience of gay men and young girls but Pat O'Brien had the job any man with testicles would do for minimum wage. Maybe Pat was quietly chased out of the sports business because he likes to get plastered and leave vulgar messages for various women in the office. Maybe he could get together with Prince Charles and start up a little phone sex business. You're so hot. I want to be your tampon.

Do women find threesomes sexy? With other women? I didn't think so but apparently Pat thinks the way to a woman's heart is through another woman's hoo-hah. And I can't speak for women, but I know that I don't find the menstrual cycle sexy. Necessary? Sure Natural? Absolutely. But sexy? Nope. Maybe Charles wants to be your tampon, but when the red tide's rolling I prefer to stay off the beach.

But I digress. In spite of the fact that I don't seek out this crap, it still filters in and I am endlessly amazed at how stupid the people we worship can be. Every decade or so we get the skinny on some fad religion. Moonies, Hari Krishnas, Eugenics. Sadly we want to make fun of Richard Gere for being a devoted Buddhist, when the real pin heads are buying into Scientology or Kabbalah. At least Buddhism isn't a sham designed to cater to insecure celebrities seeking spiritual validation. Well, maybe Buddhism does that to a degree, but it's not exactly a fad.

That's what it boils down to, you know? The same is true with the many denominations within different religions. One dogma is a little too strict for the masses so an alternative is created. Most Jews aren't interested in being quite as dedicated as their orthodox brethren so a more user friendly version of Judaism was developed over time. Through the years different popes have made adjustments to Catholicism that have softened the Vatican's stance on issues ranging from fasting to birth control all though there are traditionalists within the church who resist the changes and adhere to the older and typically more stringent standards. I call them religiots. In Islam there are Shi'a and Sunni Muslims who share a basic religion but differ violently on the interpretation. Mostly it's on how to wire the explosives.

Protestant Christianity started with Martin Luther who essentially questioned the manner in which the Vatican was interpreting the bible, which is to say that catholic leaders were robbing all of Europe at bible-point. Those gilded pages can hurt! Once Lutheranism began others followed suit with Henry VIII starting the Anglican Church for the sole purpose of expediting divorces. The underlying theme in Christianity is basically if you don't like what the preacher's saying, start your own church.

Brigham Young didn't like the idea of being stuck with one woman for the rest of his life so he took Joe Smith's Book of Mormon and ran with it...all the way to Utah where he could marry as many women as he liked and nobody could do anything about it. Especially the women, who certainly didn't want to try their luck escaping into a desert. Of course the tradition was to marry girls. It wasn't uncommon for a 13-year-old girl to be married off to a 40 year-old man back then. Charming isn't it? And you thought Ringo was a pervert for singing to 16 year-old girls, didn't you?

For celebrities it's important to be different. Sure, traditionalists like Mel Gibson will opt to use a big budget movie to cram their religion down your throat...while making a couple of million bucks. Jesus had to love that. But for stars like Tom Cruise (who is not gay) and Madonna it's not enough to be passionate about a religion, they need something special to cling to. Something that people will talk about and has a flexible dogma so they won't burn in hell for their sins. Kabbalah and Scientology create a nice buzz and the theology is pliable enough to allow the celebrity to enjoy a lifestyle of shameless excess without feeling guilty. After all, most of the traditional religions don't make one feel too good about paying $300,000 for a caviar enema.

You see, Jesus wouldn't have jumped on Oprah's couch and gone out of his way to pass judgment on Brooke Shields. Of course Jesus probably wouldn't believe that there were microscopic aliens in his brain that needed to be audited by a professional Scientologist. So if Tom Cruise were forced to ask himself "What Would Jesus Do?" we wouldn't have been treated to his disturbing behavior. Poor Katie Homes, by the time Tom's done with her she won't have a brain left (not that she had much of one to start with). The Scientologists Tom consorts with will nuke the parts of her brain that allow for free thought and Katie will be reduced to a nice rack on a set of long legs. Or what is commonly referred to as Charlize Theron. How else do you explain Aeon Flux?

According to most genuine Kabbalahists, or whatever they call themselves, Madonna and her ilk aren't practicing anything they've ever heard of. Apparently celebrities dig the name and the bracelets, but pretty much make up everything else as they go. Nothing new there. It's always better to worship in word than to practice in deed. Easier anyway.

I shouldn't be too hard on celebrities because lots of people are stupid, but celebrities make the mistake of publicizing their foolishness. And it's not just religions either. Without a doubt the absolute worst parents in the world are celebrity parents. Oh yes they are. I'm not talking about Britney Spears driving around with her baby on her lap either. Let's be honest with ourselves here.

My parents raised four kids and I don't recall ever seeing a car seat. I remember sitting on my dad's lap while he let me steer the car down the road to our house. Ok, I was 29 but still...and I'm not alone because Bruce Springsteen sang about that very same experience in his hit My Hometown. Somewhere along the line we became obsessed with car seats and now you have to securely lock children in an approved car seat anytime you think about driving. Making matters worse is the fact that legislation is being passed to criminalize smoking in the car if kids are present. Now that's just asking for trouble. For millions of parents the only thing preventing them from throwing their screaming kids out of the car is soothing power of cigarettes. Remember Susan Smith? Her kids are dead for two reasons. They were locked in car seats and mom was out of smokes. Had my parents not smoked on some of the longer trips I suspect that none of us would have made it out of childhood alive. As it was Mom and Dad only bumped off two of us. That's restraint.

And let's think about what we're getting upset with. Britney and Kevin's spawn. Britney's even taken flack for smoking around her kid. So? Do we really want that unholy munchkin growing up to plague us? No! So I say to Brit: Drive on momma. Smoke 'em if you got 'em. You've come a long way, baby! And treat yourself to a cold one, honey. It's Miller Time. Same goes for Michael Jackson. Insanity is genetic. Odds are that Wacko Jacko's kid is going to make him look as normal as grilled cheese. So bomb's away, right? I know it's mean, but kids die everyday... why not eliminate the future maniacs?

No, Britney's not that bad a mommy. Yet. The worst act of celebrity child abuse has to be in the naming of the children. Chances are the kids are going to be pretty screwed up anyway, given the fact that the parents aren't exactly stable in most cases, but then the poor tyke has to get saddled with a terrible name. Unique is always cool, and some celebrities hit home runs with names their kids will undoubtedly be proud of. Forrest Whitaker took that leap and landed successfully naming his kids Ocean, True and Sonnet, but My Name is Earl star Jason Lee should have the paperwork ready to change his child's moniker from the wacky Pilot Inspektor to something a little more grounded like Booger.

Gwen Paltrow and her overrated Sting-wannabe husband Chris Martin dubbed their first brat Apple and promise to name their second yard-ape something even more unique. I was thinking Pear since Mango was already purloined by Saturday Night Live and Banana would cause interstellar chaos if somebody tried to slide it into the name game song. Banana Fana Banana...AHHH! Perhaps they'll depart from the produce theme and opt for something smooth like Velveeta. Maybe food is too obvious and they'll shock us with something more industrial like Impact Wrench. I just hope they don't take Charmin. I was saving that one for my first child because I want people to think twice about squeezing my baby.

Bruce Willis and Demi Moore didn't do too much damage with Rumor and Scout. I don't like the names because the reference is too obvious, but those kids won't end up in a mental institution. Tallulah, however, is a bad name in spite of the fact that it has some tradition to it. That kid is going to end up being one of those Kindergarten teachers who is always two steps behind the kids. Or she'll be a spiritual advisor based out of a Boise trailer park. Sadly there are simply some names that need to die. Bertha(Butt), Eunice (Eww!), Guido(Seriously!), etc. Madonna reached into that well and saddled her son with Rocco which guarantees him a career as a either brutish nightclub bouncer or, if we're being ironic, he'll be a high strung interior decorator with a heavy lisp and a flowery personality. Either live up to the name or completely rebel against it. Diane Keaton took old names that should be forgotten a step further by dubbing a daughter Dexter. Look, Dexter's a fine name for a dreadlocked Jamaican bartender on the seedy side of the Kingston strip, but somebody as pretentious as Diane Keaton can't breed a kid cool enough to pull it off. Boys names for girls can work if the name is classic or artistic or even a little androgynous, but Dexter isn't one of them. Not by a long shot.

In all honesty, I firmly believe that these names are made up to mislead the public. I can't believe that so many people are selfish enough to pick names that only serve to draw more attention to the parents. Think about it. What did Tom Hanks name his kid? I have no idea. I didn't know what Goldie Hawn named her kid until Kate Hudson became a star in her own right. The fact is we don't talk about celebrity spawn unless the stars opt for an outlandish name. Apple might not be a great name for Paltrow's kid, but Gwen sure got some mileage out of that name, didn't she? In fact, the only reason anybody is even talking about Paltrow is because she named her kid Apple. Brilliant publicity move, but don't color me stunned when a 300 pound Apple shows up on Oprah in 20 years to whine about her horrible life named after a fruit. If only they would have named me after a specific apple, like Gala or Fuji! I would have had an identity. WAAH!

It can't be real. People can't be that shallow. Not that many people anyway.The documentation is forged and the stars are able to provide their children with a degree of anonymity. That's a good thing. Kids shouldn't have to grow up hounded by the images of their parents. Look what happened to Chastity Bono. She's fat, butch and humiliating herself on Celebrity Fit Club. Mom's hot, I'm not and the whole world's gonna know it. Nice. Cher should have spent a little less time banging roadies and a little more time being a mom, don't you think? Should have anyway. And Chastity isn't even one of those potentially hot lesbians, like the ones in adult movies...the kind her mom would be. It's almost as though Chastity chose to become a boy because her mother has such an unhealthy infatuation with them. Do you love me now?

Of course, celebrities aren't the only people to screw up their kids. Regular folks do it all the time. They try to be different and create alternate spellings of common names or they go with the arrogant angle and name their kids after themselves. Tradition schmadtion. Caesar is a salad, not a name.

Brandy and Debbie are fine, but if you fool around and try to go with Brandee or Debbi you'll seal your daughter's fate as a porn queen. Names like Tawny and Bambi are like pornography scholarships. Amy is a fine name but Aimee will find herself sleeping with every member of the Alpha Sigma Phi fraternity before the end of her freshman year. And look out for Rhea. Some pronounce it "RAY" some go with "RIA" but it's spelled "RIA" and it doesn't take long for kids to connect the name with other things that sound like "RIA". Boys are influenced by names too. Tom is a good name, but if you insist on keeping that "h" in there and the boy grows up as Thom he'll be a female impersonator. Kyle, Seth and Bruce all carry a certain cachet. And cachet is something you don't want your boy having.

I'm not implying that there's anything wrong with being gay, but you don't want your son growing up to be prissy. I'm very open-minded when it comes to sexual orientation but I want my kids to be no less than equal partners in their relationships and I prefer if they are the more dominant force. If that means junior grows up to be a top then so be it.

I've seen Tequila in use and I don't think that's a good way to go. I suppose Brandy is derived from a beverage as well but Brandy is refined and the name has been around for a long time. Tequila has a different image than Brandy. You simply don't see Brandy in those border town bars that feature a nightly donkey show, but there's always lots of Tequila. Of course high power types like to stick their cigars in Brandy so I suppose there's a trade off.

Other names parents go with are begging for trouble. Deuce is vogue now, particularly in the black community, but it rhymes with douche. Sure, if your boy grows up to be a NFL star there's no problem but if he's not very athletic he'll spend his formative years getting the snot kicked out of him on a daily basis. And don't get me started on Tre.

Hey Mike, what do you carry your lunch on?

I don't know.

You put it on a tray!

Then the food gets dumped on a kid's head, everybody laughs and Tre grows up to become a sadistic murderer. It happens. Remember the Columbine shootings? There's so much in a name.

The point I'm making (or making up for the sake of closure) is that you don't have to go to such extremes to make a fool of yourself or your kids. Simply being an active parent will humiliate your children more than any name ever could and if you feel the need to abuse them then smack them around every once in while. Once you've had your fun and they grow up, it's only fair that they not be saddled with some awful name for the rest of their lives.

As for fringe religions and cults, you don't need to seek out strange new spiritual organizations to feel like you're being manipulated, join a book club, a gym or activate a Sierra Club membership. You get the same experience of being taken advantage of without coming across as some sort of misguided freak in desperate need of salvation.