Crawling to Armageddon

It's the last day of September. A mere one quarter of the yr. remains. Thirty-five or so days until the election. Will there be any money left by then? Will we be dragging $billions around in wheelbarrows just for a trip to the 7-11©? Frankly, who gives a shit? Any one foolish enough to have invested in or committed to this system gets everything he or she deserves: nothing. We've heard the expression "We're scared to look at our 401(k)s, we don't know what we have," more than once. Schadenfreude indeed warms the heart, if there was any doubt left. Are we ready to start from the beginning again? Especially all those hoping-to-retire-soon baby boomers. Sorry you gave up your '60s socialist ways & sold out to "the man" now? Bet you are, losers.

Bail This Out, Lout!!

Here's an idea "conservatives" should be in favor of. It's a common sense return to the old days, when people worked for a living by creating real, physical products, or by providing an actual service that often involved objects & non-metaphysical stuff. And in those glorious days of restraint & responsibility, when someone wanted something, they saved their money until they could buy it outright, rather than entering a permanent state of debt. How about more of this, & fewer financial markets, obscure "financial instruments," investments, & other ways for the already wealthy to play w/ money & create nothing from less-than-nothing. How about a new system? That is, no fucking system at all. Just real rewards for real work. Any takers? Remember John Smith of whatever that colony was? "No work, no eat, spoiled imperialist spawn of the aristocracy!!" And just as there is no mention of "gawd" in the Constitution, we don't recall any mention of capitalism as the only way things can go in these United Snakes. Disclaimer: Author of piece admits he or she hasn't held down a job in over two yrs., but has made some very wise investments. Second disclaimer: Actually typed & published early evening Tuesday 30 September 2008.

Newman.

Paul Newman (l) & Mario Andretti, looking glum. (Photo: Tannen Maury/AFP)Recollections of Paul Newman from beyond the World of Show Biz™. Namely, the World of Racing©. Specifically, Mario Andretti.

"We were always fighting for the check," Andretti said. "He would never give in, never in anything. One time, we settled a check by betting on how long it would take a beer bottle to hit the floor when it fell off the table. "This time, he says, 'How many people do you think are on the street now between 8th and 9th Avenue?' He says, 'At least 75.' I said, 'No way, at the most 50.' "Our wives roll their eyes and head for the ladies room. Paul and I get up and head out to the street to check out our bet. The poor maitre d' thinks we are running out on the check. "And of course, I was right. There were barely 50 people out there, even when he's trying to count a hobo three times. So we go back and the maitre d' is relieved and I won the bet. Again."

We also heard on the radio that Mr. Newman's outfit of choice at the track (the SCCA, anyway) was Bermuda shorts, flip-flops & a tee-shirt, giving rise to the nickname "Chickenlegs." NB: Actually typed & published early evening of Tuesday 30 September 2008. Just trying to fill the blank, empty space.

What Is So Fascinating About This American Icon?

Would this Trojan have been any help at Corvallis last week?John Wayne is one of those essentially blank screens upon which America likes to project itself, & often the America projected on The Duke is not popular w/ fellow travelers, comsymps & pinkos. This can result in their denying Marion Morrison's (related to Jimbo Morrison?) considerable acting ability, or mocking the very principles on which America was founded (a powerful agent, front-end money, & a big piece of the back-end gross). Susan King of the L. A. Times covers the John Wayne retrospective academic (They're just movies, f'r cripe's sake!) blatherfest ("John Wayne: Actor, Star, Icon, Trojan.") at the University of Spoiled Children thislast wknd. And look, it's the man who personifies middle-brow film criticism, Leonard Maltin!

The 1953 3-D western "Hondo," in which Wayne plays a dispatch rider for the cavalry who meets a woman (Geraldine Page) living alone with her young son in the middle of hostile Apache territory, screens Sunday evening. Maltin believes it's one of Wayne's finest performances. "There's one long scene early on when he is talking to her while hammering some horseshoes. He has to hammer them, he has to fire them with the bellows, cool them in the water and hang them to dry on a rack. He has important dialogue through the entire scene where he is establishing his relationship with her while he performs all of these tasks. It's like choreography. And he pulls it off flawlessly and seemingly effortlessly -- Olivier couldn't have done it better."

See? There's some damn acting, philistines!

There's also an exhibition of junk through the next three mos., in a basement somewhere on the USC campus. One more thing to know:

Gretchen Wayne is thrilled at USC's tribute to her father-in-law because it "defines him as more than a movie star. There was more to him, and certainly he loved being a student at USC. He loved education." The Duke possessed a "terrific sense of humor," says Wayne. "He didn't like vulgarity. He certainly didn't like it around women."

What's your 21st century definition of "vulgarity," bee-otch? NB: Actually typed & published late afternoon Tuesday 30 September 2008. We're just trying to look as if we "create" daily.

G. W. O. T. Medal

We're expecting to receive ours in the mail any day now. If you only knew how many times we've left wherever we were on an expedition to buy a newspaper (for information on this "global war") or to make a scathing remark over the Internet about George Bush or another global terrorist, you'd understand completely how well-deserved this is.

The End

Debate's over, nothing really happened, no new things, both sounded as expected. We knew we'd be bored. And it seems as if McCain lived up to his low expectations. Wouldn't it be nice to have a presidential candidate for whom we didn't have to lower the bar so far? Remember "the soft bigotry of low expectations?" Or even (we enter fantasy land here) a democracy, w/ an educated & intelligent electorate? While we're at it, where are those flying cars we were promised by now?

Comparing Bracelets

OK, it's come to this: Both candidates have shown (we assume, we're only getting the audio – so maybe Nixon will win this one) & compared bracelets that they wear honoring or commemorating or something some poor fucking sap who couldn't find a decent job & ended up dying or at least serving in Iraq or Afghanistan or wherever the secret wars are for the same country that wouldn't give him a job. "Look, I have a bracelet too." McCain brings up his "League of Democracies." Who also control a lot of the world's economic power. And will sanction the shit out of the Iranians, So there. Heh-heh. Unless those democracies are so busy making money w/ Iran that they don't care. Then McCain says they have a lousy gov't. so their economy stinks. (That makes the sanctions really hurt!!) Excuse me, dude, looked in your economic mirror lately? Hope someone else catches him on this. McCain: blah blah blah... Obama: Annnnd, blah-blah-blah-blah blah blah...

Debate Update

We're either losing our mind (or Sen. McCain is – yes, cheap shot) or there's a digital loop repeating. Said Sen. has twice said that he wasn't elected "Miss Congeniality" in Washington. Twice. (Due to his "maverick" refusal to go along w/ whatever, you understand.) Is that why Gov. Palin is on the ticket? Bad cop, good cop? Dumb & Dumber?

Let's Have A War (W/ Pakistan?)

We missed this story of Pakistani choppers resupplying the Taliban in Afghanistan on its first go-round, but in light of the recent firefight 'twixt U. S. forces & Pakistani border patrols, we have to wonder when a Pakistani fundamentalist/Air Force general will decide to use one of those "Islamic bombs" on U. S./NATO troops in Afghan territory. And what American reaction might be. Also on Thursday, as we shot it out w/ them, U. S. Secretary of State Dr. Rice shook hands w/ Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari (Bhutto's widower?) at the Intercontinental Hotel in New York City. Photo: Louis Lanzano/AP

W/ Bated Breath

Mere moments from the very first "debate" (Q&A session, at best) & our first attempt at so-called live blogging. Haw haw!!! Gotcha!! No way in hell! Not gonna happen. Not until Hell hits 0°C (No Fahrenheit 32° = frozen water crap!!) or the overnight temperature here in "The Southland" dips under 17°C. "Live" blogging my patoot. If we could type that quickly we could hold down a real job. No, wait, lehrer says financial wjhatnot is part of nat'l. policy & foreign security...now he's asking a question "where do you stabd on the financila recovery plan?" derfining moment two wars great depression main street howz it gonna affect me job housr retirement college? 1805PDT: getting money back no. 3 pad CEO bankacccts. foreclosures all across the country eight yrs. failed econmonic policies Bush gasn't worked...trickle down Middle class getting a fiar shake. McCain says Kennedy is in hosp. tonight, callls him "lion of the senate" starts slow...wallows in emotion, enough already...

Jeezis Loves The Little Children (Until Their "Moms" Get Home)

Below: Tony Alamo & Mrs. Alamo (Susan). From the AP story linked below: "When his wife died of cancer, Alamo claimed she would be resurrected and kept her body on display for six months while their followers prayed. It would be 16 years before her body was returned to her family." Fuck us!!Jerk/evangelist/slave-holder/labor- & tax-law violator Tony Alamo has added another to his list of accomplishments: Busted in Arizona for interstate transportation of minors for sexual purposes. Even FOX News says his past is "checkered." To put it mildly.

In an interview Monday, Alamo spoke of the allegations with a mix of denial and defiance, saying he never promoted sexual abuse but that he believes there's a mandate from the Bible for young girls to marry. "In the Bible it happened. But girls today, I don't marry 'em if they want to at 14-15 years old. Because we won't do it, even though I believe it's OK," Alamo said. In an AP interview on Saturday, he had said that for girls having sex, "consent is puberty." On Monday he bristled at descriptions of his organization as a cult, saying enemies want to cast him as a "weirdo for preaching what the Bible says." People who have left Alamo's organization say they have witnessed older men marrying girls who just reached puberty. The U.S. Attorney's Office said in an e-mail that was inadvertently sent to media last week said agents expected to find children ages 12-14 who had been abused and that they expected to file charges. The e-mail said agents believed child pornography was being produced at the compound in Fouke.

Shorter Tony: The bible sez: "If they're old enough to bleed, they're old enough to breed."

Femmes Noires

Also from yesterday's Incredible Shrinking Newspaper™©, fans of so-called noir may want to look at some of these flicks, on the big screen at the Billy Wilder Theater over the next several wks. The official title of the fest is: "Cool Drinks of Water: Columbia's Noir Girls of the '40s and '50s." Can't beat that w/ a stick, can you?

Most worth the effort, in our not at all humble opinion? Gloria Grahame,followed by Lizabeth Scott. Nina Foch, of course, went on to more fame as an acting teacher.

Here's the entire scoop from UCLA. Added note: The Glass Wall was written & produced by Ivan Tors, creator of Flipper.

Nothing Today, Really, Except Dick

Why read the book when the criticism/review tells you all? Here's the poop on VPotUS Cheney: He's a paranoid, who fears that the President of the United Snakes can't push his weight around in the manner that he (Constitutionally, yet!) should, because of the actions taken & laws passed following Nixon's attempts to push his weight around in the late '60s & early '70s. Interesting. We've heard this before, of course, but this is the bow on the wrapping. It is pretty obvious that Dick isn't in it for personal aggrandizement, though what goes on behind those eyes is anybody's guess. Probably a well-trained psychotherapist of some kind would be the best to make the guesses here.

Bush Lies, Your Wallet Dies

Saw Chicken Little on the tube tonight, squawking "Show me the money, and it'll be all right!!" Oops, songwriting (or easy rhyming) at work. Sorry. Bush made it official that we're in gigantic trouble (unless we give all the money left in the U. S. Treasury to his friends) so, along the lines of "Saddam Hussein has WMDs, etc." we can see that the economy is in no danger whatsoever, & there's no reason to give anyone any money, except to hand over CEO salaries to those who do some actual work.

Can't Get Arrested, Even

We noted just below the most recent of our failures to win a so-called genius grant from the nitwits at the MacArthur Foundation. Here's another failure: We can't get arrested. Oh, some people, who must think they're really special, can get arrested, but us, the beacon of despair in the illuminated world? No such luck. And look what an arrest can get you!! Art, w/ a capital "A."

Pieces assigned to individual rooms elsewhere in the building come across more strongly, and at least three of them brilliantly. A few are archival displays, the most arresting by the collective called Critical Art Ensemble and the Institute for Applied Autonomy, which for years have operated at the intersection of art, science and politics. In 2004 a founding member of Critical Art Ensemble, Steven Kurtz, was indicted under the Patriot Act, accused of illegally obtaining bacteria samples, among other charges. The charges were eventually dismissed by a judge. But outrage over the affair is still strong in the activist art world. And the piece at the armory titled “Seized” is Exhibit A in its ethical brief: at the center of the installation is heaped-up trash, including pizza boxes, left behind by government agents who commandeered Mr. Kurtz’s home.

Sadly, the shitheels at The New York Times will print photos in their dead-tree editions that are unavailable in the "on-line" edition. For example, the shot of the trash left by said agents at the art boy's house.

Hey, Just a Fucking Minute Here!

Did someone forget something? We're both citizen & resident of the United Snakes. How can you overlook a name like "Malignant Bouffant?" Especially when handing out money for crap like the following.

Alex Ross, 40, a music critic for The New Yorker and the author of a cultural history of 20th-century music, “The Rest Is Noise”; Tara Donovan, 38, who creates large installations out of everyday objects, as in “Haze,” a 2003 work in which she stacked more than two million clear plastic drinking straws against a 42-foot-long wall.

Here's our book title: "It's All Fucking Noise, So Shut Your Fucking Mouths Already!!" Unless Donovan stacks her straws totally by herself, she can fuck off too. We don't have any flunkies working here. It's a labor of – OK, "hate," whatever – & it's certainly deserving of 100,000 clams a yr. for the next five yrs. Man. Whose bootie must one kiss around here to get a few thousand clams just to live on?

"Straight" Talk Express Pulls to Side of Road, Everybody Gets Out For a Pee

Below: For illustration only. These whizzers are about the same age as the grandchildren of whoever remains on the ol' "Straight" Talk Express to Nowhere. So the McCain campaign has decided to "suspend" itself, due to the alleged financial crisis, & perhaps due to John Sidney McCain III's inability to multi-task. (That is, to do something about the financial melt-down at the same time that he rehearses his lies for Friday's debate, which now may not occur.) This follows Gov. Palin's whirlwind trip to the U. N. to establish foreign policy credentials by shaking hands w/ Unocal puppet Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan & international war criminal Henry Kissinger, of Hell. Wasn't a President Bush there as well? We didn't see any pictures of the lipsticked pit bull w/ Dear Leader. Nor did we hear her speaking to any members of the press. What is scaring her (or her handlers)? Questions? Can you see Russia from the U. N. Bldg.?

We again see Sen. McCain (& Gov. Palin) for the cowards they are. McCain, the surrender monkey, whose first instincts are to sell out any one he can ("Country First!!") as soon as his foolishness gets him into enemy hands, & Palin, who hasn't spoken word one to anyone since her ABC interview a wk. ago ("Bush Doctrine? Whazzat?" Look, it's Russia, right over there!!") & is still maintaining press silence. Insert the sound of chickens going "Bwok, bwok, bwok!!"

Some commie callers to squawk radio have been expressing the hope that this is the end for the McCain/Palin ticket, which only proves that hope is bullshit, but what are we to make of this huge cop-out?

Now we hear that CBS ("IBM when I CBS") late night host David Letterman, who had McCain booked on tonight's Late Show until the "suspension," had some rather mean things to say about John Sidney III. One may want to tune in later. 2335 E & P, 2235 Central, on your local CBS station.

Institutionalized Cowardice

We mentioned the feminization of the LAPD on V-E Day of this yr. As well as the oinkers coming in for their sissy drinks, various members of the military (probably from the Army Reserve or California National Guard armories located not too far from the same Starbucks™©) come in, in their digitally printed camouflage fatigues, & order sissy coffees & fruity eats. How are these wimps going to protect us from savage Moooslims who've swum thousands of miles across the Pacific, a knife between their teeth, in hope of raping just one of our precious AmeriKKKan goats? Obviously there is little hope left, if even the ground pounders have turned into latte-drinking sensitive types. We suppose they're all working on screenplays as well. Our last hope, to be defended by real men against the mostly imaginary terrorist enemy, has pretty much dried up w/ the recent announcement that even the U. S. Navy has given up & joined the psychotic Air Force weasels who murder from behind their video-game controllers.

The boats will be controlled by sailors at a safe distance on a much larger ship. [...] The first of the two boats, developed and stuffed with sonar-detection gear, cost $197 million. In the future, the price is slated to drop to $46 million per boat.

Whew, that's a relief. We were thinking this might be some kind of boondoggle.

The boats are meant to be launched by the so-called Littoral Combat Ships, shallow-draft ships that can maneuver close to shore.

Also known as Oil War Command & Control Ships.

"With the way the world is now, with terrorists just sitting around looking for new ideas to attack us, it's very important we have a way to protect our sailors as they transit through the shallow waters," said Thomas Mulkeen, one of the contractors working on the project, whose motto is "Detect, deter, defeat."

Perhaps not having "our sailors" in these shallow waters while they perform duties that Big Oil should be paying Blackwater to do would be the best way to "protect our sailors." And no fucking tax exemption for the oil outfits. They (& Europe & Japan, who get most of that Persian Gulf Oil) can pay for their own damn security for once. This former taxpayer will no longer be footing their bill.Above: This Unmanned (You ain't kiding!! Nothing manly at all going on here.) "Submarine" Hunter seems to work quite well in the shallow waters off San Diego. Hmmm.... Photo: Karen Tapia-Andersen/LAT.

Let It Drown

To hell w/ the whole fucking mess. Don't bail out one of these fucking incompetents or fraudsters or cheats or whatever they are. Just let them go to hell. The only laws or regulations that our gov't. should propose or pass are those fulfilling the cynical promise of the "free" market, that those who "risk" (& therefore, bleat the glibertarians, should be well-rewarded) should be punished if their hare-brained schemes & scams go south. That is, some sort of GIVE BACK OUR MONEY Act that will confiscate all the money, wealth, property & anything else of the slightest value that belongs to anyone (well, we'll limit it to upper management, although no one employed by these rapacious corporations is innocent) involved in the financial crisis/meltdown/standard operation of capital that fills our airwaves, Internets & news racks. Then these captains of industry & finance can be placed in jobs digging ditches, greeting at Wal*Mart, & doing yard work for illegal immigrants. We'll see how long it takes for their business genius & entrepreneurial spirit to come up w/ clever new ideas revolutionizing the yard work, greeting & manual labor fields, thereby creating new jobs & wealth, & restoring their socio-economic preeminence. Do not, however, hold your breath, except for the part where they're all drowning. P. S.: An added bonus of this Act would be that the next idiot who opened his or her fat yap concerning the wisdom of the market, the horrors of regulation, etc., ad nauseum, would, it is to be devoutly hoped, be dragged from the studio whence s/he spoke, or the Ikea computer desk whence they typed, & beaten soundly on the bottom of the feet w/ bamboo canes. For starters.

McCain Sex Update

Even in the '50s, when sex really was dirty & Hollywood movies barely showed it, & so on, John McCain was busy being a slut. Here's his partner therein, Maria Gracinda Teixeira. Nice, huh? The guy has the morals of an alleycat, & probably many of the diseases as well. He's off having sex, for gawd's sake. Then he's cheating on his first wife. Then his staff is telling him not to be seen w/ blond lobbyist what's-her-name, 'cause it "looks bad." Chris Matthews, sexist Catholic creep, was on about judging candidates on their "character" today. We're waiting for Mr. Matthews' judgment on Sen. McCain. All the evidence seems to be in. C'mon Chris.

Oh, Look, Fall Is Here!!

Hard to tell here in the no-season capital of the known universe, but the rumor is that the autumnal equinox was today; the days will be growing shorter & the evenings arriving earlier every 24 hours. Seasonal Affective Disorder, here we come... Another sign of fall is pre-season hockey (exhibition) games, especially the ones that pre-empt the usual programming on the commies w/ commercials channel to which we listen regularly. Thus were we led to other spots on the dial this afternoon, while commuting to the public library. And thus did we hear Hugh Hewitt, one of the truly deep thinking members of the brain-dead right. Hugh's approach to the current political/financial situation? Well, seems like John Sidney McCain III, who appeared on the tube today grillin' up some dead animal meat, was presented w/ a "chopper" recently. (The AP story says it was Tuesday, which is tomorrow, unless the virus/bug bite/exploded vein in our leg was more potent than we believe & has caused us to lose a day. We'd like to know why the AP doesn't do a better job time-stamping their stories.) Let's just read the whole thing.

Political Play: McCain gets "American Chopper" 2 hours, 3 minutes ago John McCain picked up a surprise gift Tuesday, an Orange County Chopper motorcycle, courtesy of the stars of the "American Chopper" reality TV series who roared in to present it to the Republican presidential hopeful. Father and son co-stars Paul and Paulie "Junior" Teutul, whose show about building custom bikes together is a popular Learning Channel staple, appeared at McCain's rally in this Philadelphia suburb to honor him with a special bike they'd built to recognize Vietnam-era prisoners of war. McCain, a former Navy pilot, spent five and a half years in a Vietnam prison camp after being shot down in 1967. His running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, introduced the Teutuls and noted that Paul Sr., like McCain, is a Vietnam veteran. The elder Teutul briefly addressed the crowd. "How many people out there love their country and the military?" he asked to loud cheers. McCain clearly was pleased with the gesture. "Sarah and I are going to get on that chopper and ride it straight to Washington!" he said. Staffers to the Arizona senator later said the chopper would remain with the Teutuls and continue to serve as a tribute to all POWs. ___ Compiled by Beth Fouhy.

Empty gesture? Of course: All of human existence is a collection of empty gestures, & stop pretending otherwise. But the extra-emptiness comes from the aforementioned Mr. Hewitt, whose conclusion from this is that he can see John McCain on a "chopper." But he can't see Barack Obama on a "chopper." And therefore McCain has the "chopper vote" locked up. We might wonder about Sen. McCain on a "chopper," as his PW injuries leave him unable to use a fucking Blackberry™©, f'r c'rissakes!! We've seen shots of Sen. Obama on his bicycle, not that much of a stretch to imagine him on a different two-wheeler. The prospect of Mr. Cindy (who, we also heard today, owns 13 cars – two of them "furrin" – in conjunction w/ Mrs. McCain) on a chopper is pretty funny. He can't even lift his arms to ape-hanger level, can he? That's why he deserves to be president, y'know? His poor arms. Mr. Hewitt, after this embarrassment, went on to play a long rant from a conference call held by Steve Schmidt, strategerist for the McCain embarrassment, & Mark Davis, John Sidney's campaign manager. One of those champions of honesty & fair play went on for some time, in response to a question from Massa Hewitt concerning alleged e-mail smears of veep-wanna-be Sarah Palin coming from a firm somehow related to some guy named Axelrod who works for Obama, w/ a load of unsubstantiated smears about this Bill Ayers guy who has actually been in the same bldg. w/ Obama on several occasions. Mr. Ayers, who set off a couple of piffling pipe bombs in Washington D. C. in the late '60s & early '70s, was the guy right behind Osama Bin Laden on the FBI's terror list, according to whichever of these paid liars was earning his money. And since Sen. Obama hasn't marched Ayers into the nearest FBI office for a little enhanced interrogation, even though they seem to live in the same neighborhood, there must be a greater connection between the two of them, & we've got to get to the truth about this. Oddly enough, Catholic cretin/Nixon speechwriter Pat Buchanan stated earlier in the day that Sen. Obama only has to "prove to the American people that he's not a left-wing radical in order to win the election." (Paraphrase.) That's right, just disprove the (sadly) baseless accusations of the right that Sen. Obama is anything more than a centrist, corporate, Democrat In Name Only type. How do they get these people? Pat Buchanan, isn't one of those commandments not to lie? But Mr. Hewittt continued, having on a couple of callers from the heartland who were both the mothers of special needs children & liked playing w/ guns. So, naturally, they both think Gov. Palin is some hot shit. One of them was very proud that she'd kept shooting until she couldn't get her shooting jacket buttoned over her grotesquely distended abdomen, stuffed w/ a four & a half month-developed fetus. She didn't make it entirely clear (nor were we listening that closely to such a mindless stereotype) which child it was, but we can't help but wonder if lead poisoning might have had anything to do w/ baby being a little slow. (Didn't walk until he was ten, she said.) So there's the right wing. Like guns? Have a couple uteri? Offspring not the sharpest knife in the drawer? You're a natural to vote for Sarah Palin. Love your country, its military, & posing atop a "chopper?" Then Big John McCain III is your man. Think that Barack Obama might be a good choice because you've got a touch of the tarbrush yourself? Well, you're some kind of racist hater who's never voted for anyone except on the basis of un-American "identity poolitics." Also from Hewitt's mouth, before we had to change the channel: "All smart-thinking, law-abiding Americans who have concealed carry permits & pack heat will be a lot safer." Keep believing that, Folk. Right until you shoot yourself. Or your mutant offspring finds it & plugs itself or you. Thin the herd. Please. Also in the mere 20 mins. we spent receiving Mr. Hewitt: Team McCain must have talked to the do-nothing Democrats in Congress today, because there was no vote on the bail-out bill. "He wanted people to lose more millions today." Not mentioned was how many trillions the glibertarians in Congress would like to hand over to those already responsible for the financial crisis, w/o the slightest apparent control or oversight.

Many Happy Returns (w/ Receipt Only)

Happy Birthday to us, & (tomorrow) to Sophia Loren.

The Right Wing "Mind" at Work & "Play"

So. A Republican dilrod who favors bombing Iran "because they threaten Israel," had a grand ol' time in the wilds of Minneapolis during the Republican National Convention. Would this be one of those "character & judgment" deals? You know, the kind of person who thinks imperialism is funny is the kind of person who gets ripped-off by the first semi-attractive woman who tells him to get undressed.

"Less taxes and more war," he said, smiling. He said the U.S. should "bomb the hell" out of Iran because the country threatens Israel. Asked by the interviewer how America would pay for a military confrontation with Iran, he said the U.S. should take the country's resources. "We should plant a flag. Take the oil, take the money," he said. "We deserve reimbursement." A few hours after the interview, an unknown woman helped herself to Schwartz's resources.

We'll take any scrap of justice we can get. Or a peek at this toad on video.

In his interview on LinkTV, Schwartz seemed opinionated and passionate. He said an attack on Iran was needed to protect Israel, and he offered how it could be accomplished through "strategical airstrikes." "Hopefully, just bomb the hell out of them from the sky. No troops," he said. Schwartz was asked if he had a message to the protesters who filled the streets of downtown St. Paul. "Get a job," he replied.

No wonder women tell him to get undressed all the time. W/ a sense of humor like that, he must be catnip to the ladies.

The House of Cards Collapses Again, We Lead The Cheers

We mentioned in passing that we had left "the market" entirely. All markets. No more self-whoring in the world of employment. No financial instruments. No investments, other than in meals & clothing. Y'know, living under the radar, off the grid & in a state of eco-oneness w/ the planet, if not the world of hate, pain, fear & rage that's been constructed atop the planet. So we were quite happy to see what we'd avoided.

Giant blue-chip financial institutions swept away in a matter of days. Banks refusing to lend to other banks. Russia closing its stock market to stop the panicked selling. Gold soaring $70 in a single trading session. Developing countries' currencies in a free fall. Money-market funds warning they might not be able to return every dollar invested. Daily swings of three, four, five hundred points in the Dow Jones industrial average. What we are witnessing may be the greatest destruction of financial wealth that the world has ever seen -- paper losses measured in the trillions of dollars. Corporate wealth. Oil wealth. Real estate wealth. Bank wealth. Private-equity wealth. Hedge fund wealth. Pension wealth. It's a painful reminder that, when you strip away all the complexity and trappings from the magnificent new global infrastructure, finance is still a confidence game -- and once the confidence goes, there's no telling when the selling will stop.

Yep, the whole thing based on humanoids & their simian emotional responses. That's an excellent idea, isn't it? We can't tell you how happy we are that many have lost trillions of $ (on paper). If only there were a way to extract lbs. of flesh from these con men & women. Hell, let's start w/ kilograms rather than lbs. How's the entire ugly mess going to end? Not well.

In the end, however, there is only so much the government can borrow and so much the government can do. The only other choice is for Americans to finally put their spending in line with their incomes and their need for long-term savings. For any one household, that sounds like a good idea. But if everyone cuts back at roughly the same time, a recession is almost inevitable. That's a bitter pill in and of itself, involving lost jobs, lower incomes and a big hit to government tax revenues. But it could be serious trouble for regional and local banks that have balance sheets loaded with loans to local developers and builders who will be hard hit by an economic downturn. Think of that, says Dugger, as the inevitable second round of this financial crisis that, alas, still lies ahead.

Are you ready to suffer for your sins yet, AmeriKKKan sheep?

Annals of Competitive Capitalism

In the grand old "If two blades are better than one, five should be a real killer!!" tradition of advertising, marketing & consumption (Remember when "consumption" was a bad thing, meaning that your lungs were being eaten away by the tee bee? No longer. Now you saps are consuming yourselves like animals chewing off their own legs to escape a trap.) we are given three-ply toilet paper. As a person who uses plenty of tee pee & has a sphincter as sensitive as the rest of our psyche, we don't see what the big deal is. Three-ply would appear to be a no-brainer. Maybe the story is what took them so long. From the AP, via MSNBC.com, here are the best two paragraphs of the four paragraph story:

The new product will be launched Monday. The company touts the toilet tissue as "ultra-soft" and says it plans to market the product to women 45 and older who view their bathroom as a "sanctuary for quality time." Industry analyst Bill Schmitz is skeptical. He said extra layers make toilet paper stronger, not softer, although he said Georgia Pacific may have added extra fibers for softness.

Imagine: You are a woman. (Or any other sort of humanoid.) You are 45 (or older). Your bathroom is your "quality time" sanctuary. This, by the way, is why assisted suicide is not popular w/ the power structure. If your life were thus, you'd be first in line at the euthanasia center, wouldn't you? Thereby ending your usefulness to the corporate or small business structure. Of course, you 'd have to be fairly intelligent, or at least unable to lie to yourself, to realize how horrid your life was.

The Filthy World of Politics & "Personal Treason"

Yesterday, Jonah Goldberg, in his weekly waste of newsprint, spent his entire column on an Obama campaign advert, as if it were a lie or something, & not very effective, either. Unnoticed (certainly unmentioned) by Mr. Goldberg was the non-stop barrage of lies, more lies, & damned lies issuing from the McCain-Palin campaign, lies about Sen. Obama, lies that Gov. Sarah Pitbull tells about herself, and just bullshit in general. Today at the WaPo, one of their house flunkies examined Sen. McCain & his recent record. As always, the juiciest parts may be found here.

"I broke my promise to always tell the truth," McCain said. Now he has broken that promise so completely that the John McCain of old is unrecognizable. He has become the sort of politician he once despised.

That's where one may first notice that Mr. Cohen is a Broderesque fool. There's only one sort of politician, and that would be a "politician." Their very motives (greed, lust, power, self-aggrandizement, ad nauseum) are suspect, as are those of an op-ed writer who thinks some of them are somehow special or different. Ninny!!

I am one of the journalists accused over the years of being in the tank for McCain. Guilty. Those doing the accusing usually attributed my feelings to McCain being accessible. This is the journalist-as-puppy school of thought: Give us a treat, and we will leap into a politician's lap. Not so. What impressed me most about McCain was the effect he had on his audiences, particularly young people. When he talked about service to a cause greater than oneself, he struck a chord. He expressed his message in words, but he packaged it in the McCain story -- that man, beaten to a pulp, who chose honor over freedom. This had nothing to do with access. It had to do with integrity.

Can Mr. Cohen can even define "integrity" any more, let alone point to anyone, in any sort of public life, who can stake the slightest claim to said quality? (Which, regular readers of this screed will recall, is one of those vague concepts such as "honor," "courage" & "patriotism" that have never truly meant much, & have had most of their actual meaning taken from them through their constant repetition by those who should be the very last to invoke them.)

McCain has soiled all that. His opportunistic and irresponsible choice of Sarah Palin as his political heir -- the person in whose hands he would leave the country -- is a form of personal treason, a betrayal of all he once stood for. Palin, no matter what her other attributes, is shockingly unprepared to become president. McCain knows that. He means to win, which is all right; he means to win at all costs, which is not.

Here's where you don't get it/them at all, Mr. C. (This is also a condition that occurs in law-enforcement & security/intelligence agencies. The country must be saved, and we are the best agency/group/person to do it, therefore it is as important to national survival to jostle for precedence, not share information, & so on, w/ competitors on our side, as it is to deal w/ the enemy without.) Sen. McCain probably believes that Sen. Obama really is a stealth Marxist-Muslim dying to turn us over to the Saudis (oh, wait...) & whatever he does against Obama is justified. Or he's yet another Republican simpleton who's turned his campaign over to clowns who'll only be remembered if they "win," not how. Either way, he's a lying sack of shit. Sen. Obama? They haven't caught him in any whoppers yet. Except when he denies his Muslim Marxism.

Life in the Off-RampFast Lane

Hokey Smokes, what a day!! Awakened barely in time to bus quickly to the Tar Pits, in search of cash, & just made it. In the back of our mind, worried because the cable wasn't on when we left. (Did our kind & generous housers forget to pay the bill? Mere technical difficulties? Has it been decided there'll be no more free – if only basic, non-digital – cable for the recently unhoused & still disturbed? This sort of thing will really disturb us! And, we just spent $17.00 + change on a universal remote to make the freaking telebision set work adequately. Damn.) The economic crisis or whatever it is that seems to be occurring is of no importance to us, as we are informed by Sen. McCain that the fundamentals of our economy are sound, so there's nothing to worry about there. (And, of course, we made the decision to get out of the market – the job market, that is!! – well in advance of this meltdown. All we can say to those seeking financial advice & future retirement security is: arm yourself & threaten someone. If you don't go directly to jail, w/o passing "go" & collecting $200, but instead find yourself in the wig house, you're half way to a successful retirement!!) Indeed, the only worrisome thing (besides the cable) is the possibility that McCain & his creationist sidekick, Mme. Moose-Murderer, may be "elected" come Nov., & would then have an actual say in the fundamentals of our economy. (Could affect our Social Security.)

New Anti-Capitalist Party

After much well-deserved time off, we return w/ "hope" (that amorphous, meaningless concept) from our French siblings-in-revolution (well, cousins, at least) as "profiled" in Sat.'s NYT. Here's all you really need to know:

In the 2007 presidential election, Mr. Besancenot won 4.1 percent of the vote with the slogan, “Our lives are worth more than their profits.” But in the year since, as the Socialist Party has squabbled over its leadership and Mr. Sarkozy has picked off a few Socialist figures for his own cabinet, the young radical has become almost mainstream — serious surveys show that more than 60 percent of the French regard him favorably. [...] So he is trying to gather other small, left-wing parties into a new grouping: the New Anti-Capitalist Party, which is intended to provide an umbrella voting list for those unhappy with the impact of capitalism and globalization on the poor, the environment, the third and fourth worlds, and on the rights of women and homosexuals.

Huh? "Fourth world?" We were recently wondering what exactly had happened to the "second world" of "communist" gummints, now we find a "fourth world?"

Annals of Lumber

We didn't dare publish anything yesterday, Sat. the 13th being too close to Fri. the 13th. Besides, between the hideous Metrolink accident & George ("It is this reporter's opinion...") Putnam dying, events have been just too overwhelming for us to add anything. As for now, "Be vewy quiet, we'uh sweeping."

Sarah Palin Update

If you clicked here to read our hate-filled rant against Republican Vice-Presidential candidate Palin, & a thorough critique of her interview w/ Charles (What the hell kind of name is that?) Gibson on ABC World News last night, you must've forgotten that we are homeless & don't have access to a telebision set. Except, no, wait a minute, we aren't unhoused, we're still "homeless," but we're MOTELED!! And have a telebision. W/ cable!! Basic, but who's complaining? Big ups (as today's youth so colorfully put it) to Step Up on Second, in Santa Monica (Rich readers: Make a donation here!) who recently purchased a dumpy motel in Santa Monica, close to the border w/ icky lower-class Los Angeles (Again, who's really complaining?) which they will be using for their homeless/runaway troubled teen program, but in the meantime, until December when they start converting it, they are housing semi-competent, "non-volatile" (If only they knew, ha ha!!) types such as ourself, who are otherwise w/o a bed, in the dumpy motel. We know, as Nietzsche so ably put it, that gratitude is an emotion for dogs, but we'll make an exception in our case (rules are made to be broken, especially if they concern us) & type a fairly good-sized "thank you" to all there who've helped us in our time of need. And now, before we get any sappier, we must go recover our bags from under the bush in the park, return to our new-to-us but somewhat moldy domicile, shower, & relax. Don't expect to hear from this web log any time soon, we have eight months of tee vee viewing & quite a few hrs. of sleep to catch up on. P. S.: When we typed "Sarah Palin" in the title box, we typo'ed it "Sarah Plain." Freudian?

Annals of Cinema (DVD Version)

Screw politics, & the horse it rode in on. Seriously, we've had enough. We're lightening up. It's Kultur Time. Take a look at Debbie Reynolds' gams, & mellow out.From The New York Times' DVD column, a review of How The West Was Won, w/ some serious fawning over the John Ford section, "The Civil War." Dig this (Links from The NYT):

“The Civil War” is an exquisite miniature (unfortunately padded out by some battle sequences lifted from “Raintree County,” an earlier MGM Civil War film) that consists of only three scenes: a mother (Ms. Baker) sends a son (Peppard) off to war; the son has a horrible experience as night falls on the battlefield of Shiloh; the son returns and finds that his mother has died. The structure has a musical alternation: day, night, day; exterior, interior, exterior; stillness, movement, stillness. In the first and last scenes the famous Fordian horizon line extends the entire length of the extra-wide Cinerama frame. In the aftermath of the battle the horizon line disappears in darkened studio sets. The sense of the sequence is profoundly antiwar — Generals Sherman and Grant, played by John Wayne and Henry Morgan, briefly appear as a couple of disheveled, self-pitying drunks — and it gradually becomes apparent that the elderly Ford is revisiting one of his early important works, the 1928 drama “Four Sons.” The expressionistic middle sequence, with its studio-built swamp, refers to F. W. Murnau, whose “Sunrise” was one of the great influences on the young Ford, while the open-air sequences that bracket it, with their unmoving camera, long-shot compositions and rootedness in the rural landscape, recall the work of the American pioneer D. W. Griffith. When, in the final panel of Ford’s triptych, a gust of wind tousles Peppard’s hair in the foreground and then continues across to the forest in the middle distance and on to the stand of trees in the most distant background, it seems like a true miracle of the movies: a breath of life, moving over the face of the earth. No less formidable a filmmaker than Jean-Marie Straub has called “The Civil War” John Ford’s masterpiece; for the first time, thanks to this magnificent new edition, I think I know what he’s talking about. Birth, death, rebirth.

Damn. Of course, we've not seen HTWWW ("Won," that's almost amusing.) on the really big screen since 1963 (we've caught it a couple of times on TCM) but if we ever live anywhere again we'll definitely be renting & re-examining it. And for the straight ladies & gay guys in the crowd, here's Jimmy Stewart saying "How" to a redskin. Any one offended yet?

The Real Tragedy of 11 September Happened in 1973

Here's the Ass Press version of the hot poop on at least some of the machinations of Richard M. Nixon, the original George W. Bush (except the Nix had a certain shrewd intelligence missing in our current Dear Leader) & the 11 September coup in Chile. (See below.) Even more fun may be the fuller story, w/ audio, from the pinkos who dragged this info from the National Security Archives. Below is the cover of the pinko book. Look at that bloodsucker. Hitler & Dracula's idiot bastard son.

"Honor." John McCain Can't Define It, Neither Can We

Just two more date-related items. From the 9/11 that should "be put behind us, so we can move on w/ our lives": The Big Blue Buses (known to much of the rest of the world, if at all, as the City of Santa Monica's bus system) have been driving around today w/ this message on their headsigns (besides route # & destination, of course): "HONOR THE VICTIMS OF 9/11." What the Official Home of The Homeless™, also known as the People's Republic of Santa Monica© means by this is debatable, though we might go out on a limb & suggest that it's an "unpatriotic" message, meaning that the "victims" (& remember, no one is innocent, so there really aren't that many "victims") should not be used as political pawns by the forces who want to continue to hold power, & have no way to do so besides scaring your already yellow-wet pants off you.

Enough w/ Mormon Murder Day, Already

We're over halfway through & no attacks yet. Have any of our right-wing viewers wet their pants yet, perhaps at the sound of a backfiring automobile, or the sight of a swarthier than you person wearing a towel on his or her head? Not to worry, here's more outrage. That is, we're outraged that people are offended by factual truth.

On Wednesday, South Carolina Democratic Party Chairwoman Carol Fowler told a reporter for the website Politico that Sen. John McCain chose a running mate "whose primary qualification seems to be that she hasn't had an abortion."

Tell it as is, Chairwoman Fowler.

Also on the call was Tennessee Rep. Marsha Blackburn, who alleged that Fowler's remark was part of a sexist pattern by the Obama campaign, starting in May when Obama addressed a reporter as "sweetie."

We've seen Rep. Blackburn on telebision. She's an active drooler. How these fucking creeps in the Republican party can say word one about sexism or racism when they're the ones who took over the political South w/ their "Southern Strategy" of barely-coded racism, and have been consistently opposed to rights & freedom for the fairer sex is beyond us, but at this stage of the game, what isn't?

Not a Good Day for The Rational

Today is a red letter day for religious murder. Both Mormons & Islamists (Oddly enough, both religions were founded by loser criminal sex perverts who somehow received personal revelations from gawd. This sort of activity is now diagnosed as psychotic, schizophrenic, delusional, or all three.) took out some of their enemies today; the Mormons in 1857 in the so-called Mountain Meadows Massacre (which should have "Mormon" tacked on, both for alliteration & factiness).

Bush Babble

Dear Leader speaks (& you know it didn't sound a bit like the text version) from the safety of the Pentagon:

For future generations, this memorial will be a place of learning. The day will come when most Americans have no living memory of the events of September the 11th. When they visit this memorial, they will learn that the 21st century began with a great struggle between the forces of freedom and the forces of terror. They will learn that this generation of Americans met its duty -- we did not tire, we did not falter, and we did not fail. They will learn that freedom prevailed because the desire for liberty lives in the heart of every man, woman, and child on Earth.

"Did not fail." Nope, just neglected ever to find Bin Laden, & managed to create more enemies & bring them together by invading a country that had nothing to do w/ the attacks, but was weak & oily. And another juicy piece of stupid from a juicer:

10:08 A.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all. Mr. Vice President; Secretary Gates; Madam Speaker; Justices of the Supreme Court; members of my Cabinet and administration; members of Congress; Admiral Mullen and the Joint Chiefs; Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, a first responder on September the 11th, 2001; directors of the Pentagon Memorial Fund -- Mr. Chairman, congratulations; families and friends of the fallen; distinguished guests; fellow citizens: Laura and I are honored to be with you.

Yes, Donald Rumsfeld, SecDef, who was a "first responder" when the nation was under physical attack for the first time since Pearl Harbor. But, instead of getting to a secure location, taking command of air defense, or doing anything along the lines of his position, he was running around like a chicken w/ its head cut off, trying to push gurneys around, & probably just getting in the way. Fortunately, his later conduct of the illegal & stupid invasion of Iraq & the following occupation was letter perfect.

The Real 9/11 Horror

Rerun time again. Amazing how the yrs. pass like nothing; before we know it, we can recycle the same stories again. Below: A smiling Augusto Pinochet enjoys privatizing Chile's Social Security.There is another anniversary to be recognized today, of an event 35 yrs. ago. Rather than making you click your way to it (although for the full effect you might want to) we'll just grab our text & repro it right here.

From the commentariat @ Sadly, No!, we are reminded by Qetesh the Abyssinian (even as we watch MSNBC re-running the Today show of six years ago, w/ the whole mess) of a previous 11 September, in Chile. Let's go to Qetesh:

Finally, let’s not forget the other September 11th. I just wish that some idiots would realise that behaviour like the first leads to behaviour like the second.

She spells in that cute way because she's a cat, & lives in Australia. Below, the last photo of Salvador Allende before his murder at the hands of fascist thugs supported & financed by the CIA, on the orders of Richard "Murderhous" Nixon & Henry "Killer" Kissinger.

Should you wish some sort of editorial comment on this all-AmeriKKKan mess, the Incredible Shrinking Newspaper™© has some, although it's weak-kneed, & acts as if economic success is worth it, even at the cost of the lives of thousands, & most of the success is reserved for those who were already successful. And Timothy Garton Ash, a "senior fellow" (Does that sound gay or just queer?) at the Hoover Institution, nonetheless has an op-ed concerning "authoritarian capitalism." No, he doesn't think that's redundant. Manufactured consent is just as good as natural consent to him. His closing line, by the way?

Pessimism of the intellect must be matched by optimism of the will.

If not an outright triumph thereof. Remember when the "free market" guaranteed that political democracy would follow, as sure as night follows day? Believe you us, we knew better then, & now it may be occurring to those who spread that particular big lie, as well. (They're not stupid, they're just slow, & blinded by their ideologies.) Indeed, we recently heard some fuckwad on the right (perhaps from the Bush Administration itself) spewing some crap about how a democracy somewhere would soon lead to a free market. Isn't it the other way around? We only wish we had a better recall of the country to which the clown in question was referring. Note (If you give a shit.): Due to the deadline restraints mentioned immediately below, we made some additions & changes to this item, @1257 PDT, rendering it slightly different from the version posted @1143.

Further Foolishness From Fools

Typing under deadline (The public library-imposed deadline of "Finish before your time is up, or it does not get published!!") probably has its advantages in discipline & whatnot, but sometimes vital points are neglected, ignored or forgotten. So we now return to yesterday's L. A. Times op-ed concerning secessionism, & a part of it to which we didn't get. This part, about the second North American secessionist convention:

The delegates settled on a list of principles they called the Chattanooga Declaration. "The deepest questions of human liberty and government facing our time go beyond right and left, and in fact have made the old left-right split meaningless and dead," the declaration read. "The privileges, monopolies and powers that private corporations have won from government threaten ... health, prosperity and liberty, and have already killed American self-government by the people." The answer, it went on, was that the American states "ought to be free and self-governing."

Yet another clue is offered to these clowns. (We really should charge for our clue-providing services). If you think that the United Snakes are dominated by corporations, just imagine how well your piddly little state (or its legislature & executive branches) will resist further corporate depredation. Look, for example, at our own beloved California & how it was under the thumb of the Southern Pacific Railroad at the turn of the last century. Frank Norris wrote a book about it, referring to the SP (on whose commuter trains the editorial staff here used to ride to school each day, up & down the San Francisco peninsula) as The Octopus. If you're so fucking worried about fascist corporations, step one is public financing of all political campaigns. Try working on that before you decide to try to secede. (Not very nihilistic of us, we know, but common sense can prevail, even here.)

Official Position

Below: Moment of impact II.It is the official position of this web log that we are completely unsocialized, could not possibly care one whit less about this horrid country & horrid world into which we were thrust w/o warning or desire, & that you people should all shut your fucking mouths about 11 September 2001. It's been seven years already, you've grown an entire new set of skin cells, if that tale is to be believed, isn't that long enough? As so many of you losers are so happy to say: "That's in the past. Get over it. Move along." Please. Now. Spare us your maudlin whining, titty-babies; try using your vocal cords to force "your" government to do something that will actually make "us" more secure. They didn't do a very good job then, and there's not the slightest indication that any part of this nation is in any way safer from dedicated fools willing to die for their cause now than it was on 10 September 2001. Death to AmeriKKKa!! (A country unable or unwilling to defend itself effectively, whether through stupidity, or a death-wish, must die.) Below: Rubbing it in. We're laughing at you.

Editorial Choices

Below: The New York Times ran this photo on page A1 this morning.And the Los angeles Times ran the one below on page A8; both photos to illustrate the absence of Kim Jong-Il from the 60th anniversary celebrations taking place in the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea.Nice goosestepping, whether by Korean cats or Korean kittens.

Is The "Surge" Surging? No, It's Not Even Working.

At last, a review of Bob Woodward's new book.

Woodward's appraisal is more nuanced. He argues that the current situation was created by the confluence of three forces of which the troop surge may be the least consequential. More important is a hyper-secret new program (by inference, a combination of technology and operational techniques) that has allowed U.S. forces to identify, locate and kill huge numbers of the insurgency's leaders, including members of Al Qaeda. When military and White House officials learned that Woodward knew of the secret program, they asked that he withhold any details because publication would endanger the operation and compromise its use elsewhere. Responsible though Woodward's decision may be, it lends a fairly frustrating opacity to what is "The War Within's" biggest revelation. The author also argues that the diminution of violence in Iraq owes a great deal to the so-called Anbar Awakening, in which the tribal sheiks in that crucial Sunni-dominated province have turned on Al Qaeda and aligned themselves with the U.S. and the new central government. Woodward points out that the success in Anbar began long before the surge with the Marines' successful counterinsurgency efforts on the Syrian border. The result of those efforts reached critical mass at about the time the surge began. In fact, Woodward quotes a memo from one of Gen. David H. Petraeus' counter-insurgency experts, musing that the troop surge has had the opposite effect from the one intended, which was to give the Maliki government a safe space into which it could extend its influence as a national regime. Instead, the memo argues, the presence of additional U.S. troops has allowed the tribal leaders to assert themselves and their influence not only locally but also on the Baghdad government in an evolving but specifically Iraqi expression of civil society.

Not to mention, as many pundits/loudmouths/blowhards more widely circulated than we are (Bitter? Sure we are!) has, now that Baghdad has pretty much been segregated into all-Sunni or all-Shia neighborhoods, there's no one left to kill. As well as the United Snakes, filthy materialists that they are, having begun to pay the various tribal leaders not to shoot at AmeriKKKan troops, but to shoot w/ us, against all those terrorists, or patriots, or whatever they are. So the surge is as meaningless as virtually anything else Bush has told us, & somehow Obama, when confronted w/ "the surge" by Bill O'Reilly recently on FOX News Channel, didn't refer to this book (Is he so fucking busy on the campaign trail he doesn't know what's going on?) but said "Oh, beyond our wildest dreams," or crap to that effect. Loser.

Are Op-Ed Writers Really This Stupid? Why, Yes, They Are.

A dumb cluck trying to pimp his upcoming book

Christopher Ketcham contributes to GQ, Vanity Fair, Harper's and many online publications. He is writing a book on American secessionism. christopherketcham.com

writes on the "all-American" subject of state secession, in conjunction w/ Sarah "The Moose-Eating Barracuda"Palin's affiliation w/ & appreciation of the Alaskan Independence Party in today's L. A. Times. He thinks secessionism is a American as a lynch partysorry, apple pie.

Secession worries the staid opinion gatekeepers of the major media. Sarah Palin's "flirtation" with the AIP should make us "uneasy," as Rosa Brooks warned in these pages. Palin's secessionist ties raise "serious questions," averred the New York Times. A more honest assessment is that the separatism of the Alaskan Independence Party is not so weird or wacky -- or out of keeping with what appears to be a sentiment rooted in that loveliest of American predilections, our crotchety contrarianism.

Maybe so. It wouldn't kill us (immediately) here at Just Another Blog (From L. A.)™ to secede from these United Snakes. (Imagine: gay marriage, reasonable dope laws, general pinko West Coast freedom of & from the repressive whatnot of the dolts living too far from the oceans. Also imagine China/Russia/India/Brazil deciding to help themselves to California. Just whose army, navy, air force & marines are going to stop them?) But the point w/ slimy Sarah P. is that she's on the ticket w/ überpatriot John McCain, whose slogan is "Country First." Well, sometimes it's "Reform, Prosperity, Peace." ("Mr. Orwell, to the white courtesy 'phone, please. Mr. Orwell, paging Mr. Orwell.") Seems somewhat odd for Mme. Moosemurder to be all for the AIP, while claiming to place "Country First," doesn't it, Mr. Ketcham, you fucking dolt?

Interview w/ the Government

Sadly, our un-enhanced interrogation this morning was merely an eligibility interview w/ the Housing Authority, & only took 25 min. max. Not counting the time in line in the hall, & the waiting room, of course. Once again the competence of non-law enforcement gov't. employees who help rather than hinder others is demonstrated. (Not, mind you, that this is always the case. Other troubled & unhoused people that we know – Hey, wait a minute, we had our own fucking problems with the piece of shit moronic idiot jerks who couldn't social work their way out of a paper bag at the Hollywood Mental Health Center of the County of Los Angeles Mental Health Department. And, oddly enough, the other people who were dissatisfied w/ service that we were about to mention when we interrupted ourself had poor to non-existent service at the Edelman Mental Health Center of the aforementioned County Mental Health Dep't. Fuck those bastards!! Fellow Angelenos, do you know how your tax dollars are being wasted by these creeps? There'd be fewer smelly people wandering the streets screeching at their invisible friends if those Mental Health Dep't. employees would make the slightest fucking effort at knowing or doing their jobs. And why is the law-enforcement side of gov't. not watching us for threats & promises of the violent overthrow of the U. S. gov't? What secret words must we type here so that the mighty federal supercomputers will pay attention to us & make a name for us. Off the pig!! String up the bastards!! Death to AmeriKKKa!! Bin Laden rules, George Bush drools!!!!

A Date Like None Other (Completely Dull)

As the Editorial Staff here will be under gov't. interrogation at an undisclosed location tomorrow morning, we'll just leave you w/ a bit of what happened today in "history," in case we never get out. Nothing interesting so far. 1813: Oliver H. Perry sent his famous message, "We have met the enemy, and they are ours," after defeating the British in the Battle of Lake Erie in the War of 1812. 1846: Elias Howe of Massachusetts received a patent for his sewing machine. 1939: Canada declared war on Germany, entering WWII. 1963: Twenty black students entered public schools in Birmingham, Mobile, and Tuskegee, Alabama, after President John F. Kennedy sent National Guardsman [sic] to end the standoff with Alabama Governor George Wallace. (Just one National Guard guy? That George Wallace was a wuss.) 2002: Switzerland became the 190th member of the United Nations. That's some excitement, huh? Canada & Switzerland, two of the world's most exciting nations, did something. And sewing machine patents. No, wait, here's something...well, interesting, anyway. From the very same page, we find a contradiction: 1846 - Japan invents the rickshaw Or: 1869 - Baptist minister invents rickshaw in Yokohama, Japan Once again, you are forced to decide. Even most of the birthdays are those of dullards. Why, it's as if the entire world were waiting for 11 September, 2001. Elsa Schiaparelli, fashion designer (1890) Arnold Palmer, golfer (1929) Charles Kuralt, television news reporter (1934) Roger Maris, baseball player (1934) Arthur Dyre Tripp III, Mothers Of Invention, Magic Band (as Ed Marimba) percussionist (1939)* Stephen Jay Gould, paleontologist and science writer (1941) *Pointless personal note: Art used to have his 'phone number in the L. A. 'phone book. Around 1983 The Editor called him (after discovering his # by accident while looking for another # – ah, the randomness we've lost due to the rise of the devil-box) & asked if he'd play drums for Nation of Sheep, one of those "legendary" bands that never happened. Art said no, thanks for the offer, but he was going to school in order to become a chiropractor. We wonder if he did.

AQ on the Loose

These people not only live among us, they are (allegedly) charged w/ defending us from the "existential" threat of a bunch of funny-looking people sitting in caves on the other side of the world. (Are you scared yet? Only John McCain & Mme. Moosedroppings can protect us, y'know.) However, we're not following their rationale. (You can't call it logic.)

Terrorism analysts say that Americans--and American media outlets--are ignoring al-Qaida messages at their own peril. For many Americans, terrorism concerns are "falling off the radar, as al-Qaida has been silent in the USA (and much of the West) since 9-11," said Michael Sheehan, the former counter-terrorism official for the State Department and the City of New York. "Foreign attacks are mostly background noise. This is troublesome, for if we lose our focus they will attack us again at home," said Sheehan, who is now an NBC News terrorism analyst.

Does this mean that Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri is waiting for the average AmeriKKKan pig-dog to stop quivering in fear before the next attack? (Which, if successful, will probably kill a much smaller of people than the annual AmeriKKKan gunshot & automobile deaths.) Is our safety somehow predicated on alert AmeriKKKans "keeping their focus?" Is it the loathsome AmeriKKKan media outlets, who've managed to ignore international events for many yrs. now? (We could point out that if AmeriKKKans had known or cared what was occurring in the Mid-East in order to assure them cheap gas for the drive to Wal*Mart to buy cheap plastic shit something might have been done to change that, & the Islamic nutjobs might not have felt it necessary to attack. But that's a fucking pipe dream.) Or is Sheehan speaking of the "counter-terrorism community?" Are they starting to lose their focus because media outlets aren't reminding them of their duties? What weak-minded ninnies they must be, then. Some of the other experts consulted for this piece have opinions of AmeriKKKa almost as low as the one held here at Just Another Blog™.

Ben Venzke, who analyzes videotaped terrorism statements for IntelCenter, said that Americans are becoming dangerously complacent about terrorism. He said he is reminded of the weeks before the 9-11 attacks, when the public (and media) were focusing on shark attacks and the latest turns in the Chandra Levy murder mystery. "If there's an attack, it's going to be out of the blue and blindside us," Venzke said. "If we could just manage to keep our attention span," he said, Americans would be better able to put any possible terrorist attack into perspective." They [terrorists] stay patient and focused, and we become an easier and easier target," Venzke said. NBC News terrorism analyst Evan Kohlmann says, if Americans have become blasé about terrorist statements, it's partially Zawahiri's fault. "He keeps rehashing the same set of basic issues over and over again," Kohlmann said. "Given a country like the U.S., which has a collective attention span of 5 minutes, it is easy to see why people get bored."

Is it worth the effort to secure a people w/ the national attention span of a gnat? Though we still don't get how AmeriKKKans are so vital to all this. Most of them can be distracted by any shiny object. Show them anyone wearing a turban or the like, & their pants are wet & the "furriner" is dead meat. Remember the Sikh gas station attendants killed in Texas immediately after 11 September 2001? That's what you can expect from this country. Not unlike G. W. Bush. Attack people who had nothing to do w/ the original attack. If the counter-terrorism crowd expects savvy, alert 'Murkins to help defend the rest of us, their confidence is sorely mistaken. Two guys w/ beards & their underwear wrapped on their heads, speaking anything but English, would be enough of a distraction for some of “the white men of Waziristan” to do anything they wanted to. Yes, imagine that, "white people," glorious members of the greatest "race" on the face of God's Green Golfball, & they are traitors to whiteness!! Oh, the shock, the shame, the horror!!

Nihilism Update II

Here's the MSNBC take on the possible "not w/ a whimper, but w/ one hell of a bang" human-caused end of everything, or our poor suffering planet, at least. Juicy parts:

Black holes aren't Wagner's only worry: He also is concerned that when the collider creates a soup of free-flying quarks, some of those quarks might recombine in a hazardous way — creating a stable, negatively charged "strangelet" that could turn everything it touches into more strangelets.

The lawsuit also suggests that magnetic monopoles — basically, magnets with only a north or a south pole, but not both — could be created in the collider and wreak havoc.

General scientific consensus is "no," but we can hope, can't we?

California Uber Alles

Lotsa historical crap happened on this date, including: 1776: The Second Continental Congress changed the name of the nation to the United States of America, from the United Colonies. 1850: California became the 31st state. 1893: President Grover Cleveland's daughter, Esther Cleveland, became the first president's child to be born in the White House. 1926: The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) was created by the Radio Corporation of America. 1948: The People's Democratic Republic of Korea (North Korea) was created. 1956: Elvis Presley appeared on television for the first time on The Ed Sullivan Show. 1957: President Eisenhower signed into law the first civil rights law to pass Congrefs since Reconstruction. 1969: Your Editor's male parental unit, driving while legally drunk, tried to pass someone on a curve & paid for it w/ his life. 1971: The Attica prison rebellion began, leading to 43 deaths. 1976: Communist Chinese leader Mao Zedong died in Beijing at age 82.

Today in the Sheer Utter Pointlessness of "Human" Existence

In 1974, Ford pardoned Nixon for his many crimes, setting the precedent that no President will ever be held responsible for anything besides having an active sex life. Good job, Jerry. People now dead but born on this date: Richard I, Coeur de Lion (1157-1199); Antonín Dvorák (1841-1904); Alfred Jarry (1873-1907); Jimmie Rodgers (1897-1933); Peter Sellers (1925-1980); Patsy Cline (1932-1963) & many others too dull to mention. Scotch™ Brand Cellulose Tape was developed today in 1930.

John McCain's Service Record

Our memory stabbed us this morning (following that 20 oz. cup of Pike Place Roast™©) w/ something from the J. Sidney McCain III piece in the Incredible Shrinking Newspaper™© last wk. To wit:

On Oct. 26, 1967, in the air over Hanoi, an alarm signaled that a surface-to-air missile had locked onto his plane. He should have tried to evade the missile but decided to release his bombs first. The missile took off the plane's right wing; McCain ejected. He landed, with a broken leg and two broken arms, in a lake in the middle of Hanoi. After he was pulled from the water, he was bayoneted in the ankle and groin.

Did you get that? Sid, who took a free education from the U. S. Navy & managed to come in fifth from the bottom of his class, & who caused the destruction of several aircraft (not sure of the numbers, we hear many different stories) in training & otherwise (Note well, waste-fighters & reformers: Those planes cost millions of your taxpayer dollars each!!) was more interested in dropping a couple of 500-lb. dumb bombs that probably wouldn't have hit anything anyway than he was in saving his expensive aircraft & himself (mostly worthless, but a good chunk of money invested in his Annapolis education & flight training) from falling into the hands of the North Vietnamese. We in no way excuse the rotten treatment Fly-Boy Johnny received from Uncle Ho's minions (Reflect, however, so-called patriot, on your possible reaction if, say, a Chinese aviator had been bombing your neighborhood & you got a chance to have a few moments alone w/ the high-altitude baby killer.) but it's not "heroism." It's pathetic survival. If McCain had evaded the NVA SAM he would have continued to fly missions, rather than letting his flight training molder in solitary confinement for five-and-a-half yrs. Nor would we have been out an A-4. That's not serving your country. That's serving yourself, George W. Bush-style; G. W. being another great waster of the military resources of This Great Nation of Ours™© , both by his lack of service during the Vietnam adventure, & his essential destruction of our armed forces since 2003. Do we want a Mr. Macho type w/ the common sense & long-term view of an amoeba running Our Great Nation©™? Bombs away!!

Famous Last Words

Set design at its finest. Where's Dr. No?It's no secret; we at Just Another Blog (From L. A.)™ are the dictionary definition of nihilists. Tear it down & restart the whole ugly mess, we can't possibly do any worse than we have this time around, we bleat 24/7. We are therefore almost ecstatic about the prospect of the Large Hadron Collider bringing about the end of our benighted little planet, the entire solar system, the Milky Way & perhaps the entire universe, all fourteen (or whatever is being currently guessed) dimensions of it!! This is probably one of those George Carlin deals, we'll sadly admit (The late comedic & common sense great, Mr. Carlin, was always disappointed when death tolls in disasters, natural or anthropogenic, seldom met the early estimates spewed across the sensationalistic "mainstream, old" media.) but we can only follow Jesse Jackson by advising fellow nihilists to "keep hope alive." There are some who think it will be trouble.

Scientists say there's a chance that the LHC could create microscopic black holes, a phenomenon never before observed on Earth. They hasten to add that the tiny singularities will instantly pop out of existence, but that hasn't stopped critics from trying to block the collider's startup. Two of the critics have filed suit in federal court in Hawaii, seeking the suspension of LHC operations until more studies are done. Responding to the critics, CERN has issued a series of reports explaining why the LHC will pose no threat. Ellis was one of the report's authors. "If the LHC were to make microscopic black holes, it would be tremendously exciting — and no danger," he said.

Darn the luck. But there's always that chance that Mr. Science & his pals are wrong wrong wrong. And although the (European, need we add?) scientists are going to start whipping those particles around the LHC come Wednesday, it will be months before the particles are moving at virtually the speed of light, so we can't rationally expect not to wake up Thursday a. m. (Well, not because of a microscopic singularity anyway. There are many reasons not to awake Thurs. a. m., from cardiac death in one's sleep to just plain sleeping past noon.) Another "future holocaust" denier is heard from here. Now we notice that MSNBC (from whom we steal many of our story "inspirations," ha ha) is keeping the good stuff until tomorrow, when they promise us "doomsday scenarios." Can't wait.

Ignoring Today's World

If we're resorting to "This Date in History," you know nothing has caught our jaded fancy in today's world of anger, pain & fear. The Woodward book (item below) may be good for some laughs, but the colossal screw-ups of the Bush Administration should not be surprising to anyone now, except Republican dead-enders who just will not see what is before them. So let's look behind ourselves. Think we can learn anything? We don't either. 1927: Philo T. Farnsworth, 21, Xmitted the image of a line purely electronically, via his "image dissector." This caused telebision. Mr. Farnsworth has yet to apologize. Warren Zevon died five yrs. ago today. Tupac Shakur was plugged on Vegas' "Strip" in 1996. He succumbed to his wounds six days later. In the music bidness, Sonny Rollins hits 78,& Chrissie Hynde becomes a mere 57. Below: Ms. Hynde is a member of PETA & wants you to leave the llamas alone. "Stop killing spiders," or: "Ray Davies was only this big, seriously."

George W. Bush, Average AmeriKKKan

The WaPo has the vaguely interesting story of Bob Woodward's latest book; more in the long & horrifying tale of George W. Bush & his absolute ineptitude & idiocy. Any AmeriKKKan who'd like to put a candidate in the White House on the basis of the candidate being "just like me" ("jes' lahk me-yuh") or understanding their problems "'cause she's a pitbull w/ lipstick" or anything similar is too stupid to understand the need for a rational member of an elite to be in charge. And it is shameful that only the elites (well, the cosmopolitan liberal elites, educated & knowledgeable, not the "My daddy the admiral married an heiress," or the "My family's rich, w/ a long political tradition, & we've been supporting the Nazis since they started" elites – that is, the ones who try to convince Mr. & Mrs. Middle Class Oinker that they aren't members of a self-perpetuating, power-crazed elite) are capable of running This Great Nation of Ours™ anywhere but into the ground. A shame, yes, but it must be faced that the average AmeriKKKan is far, far below average. Stupid enough to believe that somehow John Sidney McCain III is not a member of an arrogant elite, but the other guy is. Enough for now w/ the horrors of today & the future, let's dip into the horror of the past, as we return to Washington, D. C., in the yr. 2006.

By mid-2006, Casey, a stout four-star general with wire-rim glasses, had been the commander in Iraq for two years. As American military units rotated in and out, Casey remained the one constant. He had concluded that one big problem with the war was the president himself. Since the beginning, Casey felt, the president had viewed the war in conventional terms, repeatedly asking how many of the various enemies had been captured or killed. Casey later confided to a colleague that he had the impression that Bush reflected the "radical wing of the Republican Party that kept saying, 'Kill the bastards! Kill the bastards! And you'll succeed.'" Casey was troubled by the thought that the president didn't understand the nature of the fight they were in. The large, heavily armed Western force was on borrowed time, he believed. The president often paid lip service to winning over the Iraqi people, but then he would lean in with greater interest and ask about raids and military operations, grilling Casey about killings and captures. Months earlier, during a secure video conference with top military and civilian leaders looking on, he told Casey that it seemed the general wasn't doing enough. "George, we're not playing for a tie," Bush had said. "I want to make sure we all understand this, don't we?" Later in the video conference, Bush emphasized it again: "I want everybody to know we're not playing for a tie. Is that right?" In Baghdad, Casey's knuckles whitened on the table. The very suggestion was an affront to his dignity that he would long remember, a statement just short of an outright provocation."Mr. President," Casey had said bluntly, "we are not playing for a tie." Asked later about Casey's perceptions, Bush insisted in an interview that he understood the nature of the war, whatever Casey might have thought. "I mean, of all people to understand that, it's me," he said. But several of his on-the-record comments lend credence to Casey's concern that the president was overly focused on the number of enemy killed. "I asked that on occasion to find out whether or not we were fighting back," he said during the May interview. "Because the perception is, is that our guys are dying and they're not. Because we don't put out numbers. We don't have a tally." He said his overall question to his military commanders was, "Are we making progress in defeating them?" "What frustrated me is that from my perspective," he said at another point, "it looked like we were taking casualties without fighting back because our commanders are loath to talk about our battlefield victories."

Never in human history, since some of the inbred, retarded Roman emperors, has there been as obvious a cretin in a position of such power. (Maybe George III of Britain, when his brain was being eaten away by syphilis or whatever his problem was.) Perhaps had Bush served or paid any fucking attention during AmeriKKKa's adventurism in Vietnam he would have been slightly aware of the trouble "body counts" led to in that all-AmeriKKKan failure.