Friday, September 30, 2011

Redefining Shallowness

The Constitution as totem:
That includes canceling all but one inaugural ball; mandating that White House employees have a copy of the Constitution at hand; and convening a summit of all of America’s closest allies along with the opposition leaders from each.
From Herman Cain's campaign book (there's not even the pretense of it being a coincidental biography) This Is Herman Cain! My Journey To The White House, which one of Tina Brown's typists read to save the rest of us the bother.
The Cain Doctrine

The book’s 10th chapter is devoted to what Cain insists on calling “The Cain Doctrine,” although it’s really more a platform (memo to the Hermanator: if you can’t sum it up in a sentence or two, it’s probably not a doctrine). It is infuriatingly vague. Cain’s plan for immigration: “Secure our borders.” His plan for entitlements: “We can, and must, take this entitlement society to an empowerment society.” He says he’d replace “Obamacare” with “Caincare,” which he says would involve “formulating a compassionate approach to providing the best diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up care for Americans of all ages.”* Would he cut costs somehow? Expand coverage? No one knows! The problem isn’t that Cain doesn’t have a detailed prescription for health reform, it’s that he doesn’t even seem to know what his objective is. And keep in mind—domestic policy is supposed to be his forte. The foreign policy section is even rougher. Cain bashes President Obama’s treatment of Israel, but doesn’t explain why he feels Israel is crucial to U.S. national security or proffer a plan for peace with the Palestinians. As for the rest of the world, forget it—all he tells us is that his Afghanistan “plan would be to figure out: Can we win, or not?” Perhaps Cain should have considered following the very public debate on that matter over the last three years. And Latin America, Asia, Europe, Russia, Africa might as well not exist. An appendix adds a tiny bit of detail, but the book leaves the overwhelming impression that Cain doesn’t have any real sense of what policies he’d back as president.
Extra-wacky beliefs:
There’s an entire chapter devoted to numerology—it turns out Cain’s lucky digit is 45.
Why, he's another Reagan! Another Nancy Reagan. What's his stand on the White House china?
*Single payer? Medicare for all ages? Sounds good to us, Cain.

Metrolinking

Take a bow, Brakeman Bill.

Friday Photo Follies

Taken on Thursday:
Hot Rails to Hell. No idea where this one's headed, but hell is places like:
Simi Valley, Glendale, & Newhall, & Orange, Riverside & San Bernardino Counties.
Not that Hell-A is really much better.
Word is, do not taste the wine.

A Pig & His Dog

Plus which (Now in color, as of 1830PDT 30 September 2011):

Thursday, September 29, 2011

R.H. Factor

Today being one event or another in the wacky lunar calendar of the Hebrews (Can't you all & the Mahometans get it together enough to use a consistent calendar, moon-worshiping scum?) A. Friend has the day off, although she isn't even one of the chosen (Lotta good that little bit of egomania did them, & not that we wouldn't be sexually associated w/ an attractive woman or women of the Hebrew persuasion.) so we're off to the other side of the river Styx for the day, to be ordered around the house & lift stuff or something.

Web log activity will therefore be light, esp. because if we start looking at the Internet we'll never get in the shower & get going. (Yikes, 1045 already!)

Best wishes for the new yr., brain-dead believers.

P.S.: Absolutely unrelated:
Or is it? Must be nice to be able to take the day off for someone else's birthday or New Yr. celebration.

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Shut Your Festering Gobs

Quick reminder to the assholes polluting the Interfestation today w/ their techgasms over the Amazon Kindle Fire: Read this & then slam your fucking fingers in your laptops or w/ your tablets repeatedly until the fingers & laptops/tablets are broken, scum. Or we'll do it for you!

Closing Day

As the Major League Baseball season drags to its inevitable end today, we note that wild card teams for both leagues are yet to be determined, assuming the MLB site is accurate. (Will there be play-off games if whichever teams are tied remain so after today's games, or is there a tie-breaking procedure? Whatever. If we really cared we'd know, wouldn't we? We could look it up, but we really don't care!)

Some good news from the periphery is that Dodger Stadium Opening Day parking lot beating victim Bryan Stow seems to be improving. (We question anyone who thinks going outside is "magical," but it takes all kinds.)

Vindicated Again

Some jerks call us misanthropic. Call us what you will, our understanding of the dominant species on this planet can lead only to contempt.

In this case our instant long-distance diagnosis of Sylvester "Sly Stone" Stewart as paranoid may have been a bit quick, but:
My source says that Sly’s attorney, Robert Alan, rented him a very nice home in Woodland Hills, California with four bedrooms, a pool, etc. (Alan declined to comment.) Sly just refuses to go there. Another friend tells me, “Sly always liked living in Winnebagos. He never liked being in a house.”
Could still be a symptom of paranoia, of course.

Not to mention the source, News Corporation rag the New York Post, which paid Sly at least US$5,000 for the interview.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Worship If You Choose

Locals jacked up about Chick-fil-A opening a store in Hollywood should note this:
Being closed on Sunday will be very popular in Hollywood, we're sure. Source. Also.

Anti-Christ Contradictions

Be ready for many more clips while we're unable to watch this crap on the ninny screen.

Avoiding Like The Plague

Our current cable shortage has us viewing more over-the-air local news programming then we used to, of which a big damn part is the trial of the croaker who is alleged to have supplied Michael Jackson w/ whatever usually-used-only-in-operating-rooms drug that may have killed M.J.'s Jehovah's Witness ass. Enough, already.

Gratuitous trigger added 1750PDT 27 September 2011:
How much is this "worth?"

Signage

Has-beens, hacks & whores.
"L.A. Only." We're so lucky. But where's G.W.?
ESL mockery: Stupid furriners.

A Body At Rest

Contemplated a trip to a library for Internet activity today, as we don't want to abuse our new-found (And illegal?) wireless non-privileges, but sloth, inertia & a realization we really should shower & get dressed were we to go changed our mind pretty quickly.

Here are some pix of interesting crapconstruction we saw on yesterday's library expedition.
Doubtless a one-time firehouse.
The brick pile on the roof is for drying hoses.

Cliché Away

Having found a non-secure wireless network in our building, the following (Typed yesterday from the library.) will be struck from the record: May well be all we offer today.
Damn palms get in the way of everything.

The Good Life Of The Lazy Unemployed

The Torygraph notes that bleeding heart liberals at the United Nations hate America.
Officially there are 700,000 homeless people in the US. According to the UN, America's refusal to guarantee them access to water and sanitation, and its “criminalisation” of homelessness, is a violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. That lack of safety net has seen similar tent cities sprout up in states such as Rhode Island, Colorado, Washington, California and Virginia.

[...]

Mrs Berenzweig, 61, used to make $100,000 (£63,333) a year as a designer in New York’s garment district. Now she and her husband Michael are down and out in 'Tent City' in Lakeland, New Jersey. There is no electricity or running water and racoons steal their food. “It’s not an easy life,” she said.

[...]

After reaching the 90-week limit for unemployment benefits, they now receive less than $100 (£63) per week between them in food stamps. “The nearest supermarket is 2.5 miles away,” she said. “Usually we walk”. Social security will kick in only when she is 62, and her modest pension at 65.
Soon as their food stamps are cut they'll be back at work, just you watch.

2-4-6-8 Motorway

As usual, we are well ahead of the trend.* Not in smarty phone desire/ownership, but in auto avoidance.

The end of motoring

Young people today would rather have the latest smartphone than a flashy car. And the number of them who can drive is plummeting. Is Britain's love-affair with the car really over?

*Except when we are yrs. & yrs. behind a trend, of course.

Trigger Warning

Had we known the item above was worthsold for US$5,000,000.00+, we would have taken a better picture, or gotten closer. Gone inside, at least.

And how'd we miss this train? Now we can't wait!

Monday, September 26, 2011

Public Non Service Announcement

Due to what we'll euphemistically refer to as cash-flow troubles, Internet & cable telebision in the bunker are temporarily suspended; this is coming from a branch of a library somewhere in Southern California, which required leaving said bunker & walking(!) a mile or so.

Therefore, expect light to once-a-day logging in this space for a while.

Oddly enough, while the cable signal from the box is not signaling, the $9.99/mo. very basic, broadcast channels-only NTSC signal, & the QAM signal from TimeWarner Cable are as yet unaffected. But there's little on the QAM we can't get over the air, w/ the exception of The Weather Channel, C-SPAN &, f'r fuck's sake, Bravo. (Bravo? Why?)

So we'll be catching up on DVD viewing, reading & crap like that. Alternate choice: Sleeping all night, sleeping all day; nothing good on tee vee anyway.

We Are All In The Gutter ...

... But some of us are photographing the clouds.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Levitated Mass

Not a bullshit Catholic Mass, a real mass.
The slot at LACMA has already been excavated; we've no pix of it because it's enclosed in fencing. We may have typed something about this before, but aren't motivated enough to look for it. More, from the horse's mouth.video platformvideo managementvideo solutionsvideo player

Another Brick In Our Load

As much as moon is made of green cheese (Does "green cheese" actually occur anywhere? Beyond excessive mold? We don't really want to know, but it's a question that should be asked.) we seldom use this forum to complain about our personal suffering, but hokey smokes, we had to put on socks, shoes, a shirt and a pair of pants today merely because there'll be no milk for tomorrow morningafternoon's coffee if we don't leave the bunker (And walk several blks. to & back, f'r crissakes!) to get some.

It never stops, does it?

P.S.: It is fucking 68°F out there! Brrrr!

The New Homelessness

Two points to make here: Despite the headline
Funk legend Sly Stone now homeless
and living out of a van in LA
& the hype, he's got a fucking van (W/ electricity: Note cord!)
& sounds more paranoid than out & out "homeless."
Inside the van, the former mastermind of Sly & the Family Stone, now 68, continues to record music with the help of a laptop computer.

“I like my small camper,” he says, his voice raspy with age and years of hard living. “I just do not want to return to a fixed home. I cannot stand being in one place. I must keep moving.”
Yes, it's the hard-knock life alright.
The van is parked on a residential street in Crenshaw, the rough Los Angeles neighborhood where “Boyz n the Hood” was set. A retired couple makes sure he eats once a day, and Stone showers at their house. The couple’s son serves as his assistant and driver.
Rough? Not unless the house has bars on the windows. Sounds more like luxury. Assistant & driver? Laptop? Showers? Owns a Studebaker?
And he cut a CD that was released last month.Our fave, from Sly's salad days:

Police Beat

Waiting at a 7-Eleven for someone they can tase half to death & then beat w/ their batons. A minimum of five are needed for each individual citizen or alien (legal or otherwise) they assault. Looks as if they have a quorum.
We figure we took our life in our hands merely by shooting them. How much would you bet the littlest one on the right is a festering cauldron of deep-seated psychological "issues?"

Creature On The Traffic Control Box

Yes, the placa says "Osama."

Saturday, September 24, 2011

++Ungood: Roberts & Black

George W(orst). Bush's fave historian, Andrew Roberts, thinks Conrad Black's upcoming autobio is "superb."

And he thinks our hearts are burning for the answer to this pressing papal question:
Buried away on page 48 of the former press proprietor Conrad Black’s superb, soon-to-be-published autobiography, A Matter of Principle, is the answer to a burning question that very many people have been asking for several years: What does the pope really think about Islamic immigration into Europe? What, in his heart of hearts, does the Supreme Pontiff of the world’s estimated 1.15 billion Roman Catholics truly feel about the future of Western Civilization in a continent that has seen such large-scale Muslim immigration over the past half century?
Hey, the Holy Father (All other fathers are therefore unholy?) was only quoting someone else, y'know?
Everyone remembers the massive international controversy surrounding Pope Benedict XVI’s lecture at Regensburg University in September 2006, when he quoted the Byzantine emperor Manuel II Palaiologos, one of the last Christian rulers before the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans: "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." There were riots in the streets of many Muslim countries, the Pakistani Parliament demanded a retraction, Christian churches were firebombed—including five in the West Bank and Gaza, our exciting new Palestinian state—and 100 Muslim clerics wrote an open letter criticizing the speech, even though all the pope was doing was quoting someone else. As security was stepped up around St. Peter’s, the Vatican issued an apology, saying that the pope "sincerely regrets that certain passages of his address could have sounded offensive to the sensitivities of the Muslim faithful and should have been interpreted in a manner that in no way corresponds to his intentions."
Not to worry, that non-apology apology placated the teeming hordes for a while. Did you notice the sarcasm? "Our exciting new Palestinian state." Compare & contrast w/
The great thing about being the Vicar of Christ, who has the job literally for life and without the need to stand for reelection, is that you can say precisely what you believe without fear or favor from anyone terrestrial. You’re even the sovereign of a state, so no secular power can touch you either.
Which Nazi had the line about the how many divisions the Pope had?

It gets worse, & only intensifies our desire to burn enabler Tina Brown & Roberts at the stake as witches, much like the humanitarians of the Roman Catholic church once did. The Muzzies were "only evil & inhuman," quoth the Pope? A pox on all your houses of religion.

The revsionist/denialist Mr. Roberts neglects any mention of why Black is a "former press proprietor," of course.

Better Late Than ...

Sometimes, if not better, just as well. The Belated Nerd. We'll be busy the rest of the evening.

$16.00 Utility Muffin Stuffin'

The Justice Department says their Inspector General's conclusion that they paid $16 per muffin at a legal conference in 2009 is, pardon the pun, half baked.

"Under a complete accounting of the services provided for the Executive Office for Immigration Review conference, it is clear that the muffins did not cost $16," DOJ spokeswoman Gina Talamona said in a statement.

"The abbreviated banquet checks did not reflect all of the food and services provided," Talamona said in an email to reporters. "The package consisted of food, beverages, staff services and function space, including a 450-seat ballroom and more than a dozen workshop and breakout rooms each of the five days of the conference."

That jibes with what the hotel said about the package, which had come under criticism from Sen. Chuck Grassley and led the White House to crack down on conference spending.
We refuse to resist the obvious.Sending the second number out to Charlena W.!

No filler version:

Last Saturday Of September

College football & quiet desperation.

One Lies, The Other Swears To It

The NYT looks at Michele Bachmann's friend Bradlee Dean.
They do get something out of being in each other’s orbit. Mr. Dean raises his profile with an association with a brand-name politician, and Mrs. Bachmann gets grass-roots followers who have been charged up on issues by Mr. Dean.

The tandem has won over people like Nate Kowalik, 35, of Plymouth, Minn., who is a big supporter of them both.

“When Bradlee says something on his show, it reinforces the message that she is trying to get out to the American voting public,” he said. “I just love it when one says something, and the other reiterates it.”

And he is such a fan of Mr. Dean’s ministry and radio show that he worked as a volunteer in summer 2009 on You Can Run’s street teams. “I like the fact that Bradlee and the others are so pro-family and that they reinforce purity and a healthy lifestyle,” Mr. Kowalik said.
Why the fuck it's in the "Fashion & Style" section is beyond us.

Projecting Again

They said it couldn't be done: Ann Coulter goes for (0:47) w/o running her fingers through her hair!A veritable Don Rickles, isn't she?

NB, Ann C.: "War heroes" aren't usually fined & asked to resign from the Army.

From The Sports Desk

Bums moving on radio dial:
The organization has agreed in principal [sic] to a multiyear deal with KLAC 570-AM, leaving KABC AM-790 after three seasons, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Fine by us. Now we won't turn on the radio & accidentally hear one of KABC's drooling would-be fascist talkers because we didn't change the station after the game. We'll get some of the buffoons who sport-babble on KLAC. A slight improvement.

Said former Brooklyn Bums failed to break 3,000,000 suckers at the Stadium for the first time since 1992. Whose fault would that be? Oh, right. His.
Major League Baseball on Friday asked a federal bankruptcy judge to order the sale of the Dodgers, arguing in court papers that Frank McCourt's plan to retain ownership of the team is "dead on arrival."

MLB does not intend to approve any sale of television rights that would help McCourt maintain ownership of the Dodgers, according to the filing, and the league could enforce its ability to strip McCourt of the team once it emerged from bankruptcy protection.
Best part of the story:
In a separate filing, the league asked that the Dodgers' bankruptcy attorneys be disqualified because they represent the interests of McCourt rather than those of the team.
May we run his ass out of town on a rail? Tarring & feathering optional.

And not from the Times: Doesn't appear as if the real Steve Harvey will be providing Bottom 10 rankings this football season, unless the Times is doing better at hiding the column than at almost anything else they do. We understand there's someone at ESPN.com or somewhere who does the same thing, but c'mon.

Moar Gunz!!

Cynical we just wonder who shot the innocent bystander. (Not that anyone is "innocent.")And we now know how the alleged bear victim died.
A hunter attacked by a wounded grizzly in a Montana forest was killed not by the bear, but by a gunshot fired by a companion trying to save him, authorities said Friday.

Lincoln County Sheriff Roby Bowe said an autopsy determined 39-year-old Steve Stevenson of Winnemucca, Nev., died of a single gunshot to the chest. The cause of death was determined by a medical examiner with the Montana State Crime Lab.
An armed society is a polite society, whether you're a bystander or a bear killer.

Friday, September 23, 2011

Autumn's Here

Which means fire season in Greater So. Cal.
Not a fiery sky, just a lovely particulate sunset shot on Sunset Blvd.

Time Not On Times'  Side?

Three to five yrs. before an end to the slaughter of trees for the local Times? According to an interview w/ Times pressman & labor web logger Ed Padgett, yes:
What’s happening at the Times these days?
They’re expecting a really bad fourth quarter. The senior vice president told us we’ve got three years more of printing the hard copy Times before they shut it down. Our plant manager says five years.

And then what – online only?
Yes.

Did things get better after you unionized?
No, they got worse. They tried to fire all of us who were involved in the organizing. The very first day after [unionization] I went to the restroom and was told that counted as my break.
Additional whatnot.

Crap, does this mean we'll have to get one of those pad/tablet do-dads to keep us amused on public transit? (Maybe there won't be public transit w/in that time-frame. Of course by then we may have given up & be riding a scooter, which will probably be moving faster than automobile traffic anyway.)

Bull-Ridin' Bristol Bristles

It's almost enough to make us wish we left the bunker more than once a wk. (Not that we'd be found at this drugstore cowboy dude ranch dump, of course, even if it is in the next block from the Riot House.)And why would Mlle. Palin think that being a "homosexual" would automatically make someone hate her mother? That's an interesting dynamic.

Bread & Circuses

The military-corporate-communications complex:
The exploitation of professional sports by the powerful is most evident in the hyperpatriotism that saturates almost every major sporting event. The aftermath of 9/11 has seen professional sports, particularly the National Football League and Major League Baseball, co-opted to promote a culture of war under the guise of patriotism and “supporting the troops." The military is more visible than ever in professional sports with fighter jet flyovers that follow the national anthem, the NFL’s military recruitment stations at preseason games, and soldiers returned from war surprising their families for all to see.
Remember, these pricks all use your tax dollars to commit class warfare against you. We'd advise burning their fucking stadia down, but of course they'd just glom onto more of your tax dollars to rebuild the dumps.

Teams that especially suck, whose owners are fascist &/or religious scum:

The Orlando Magic; L.A.'s Lakers & Kings; Philly's Flyers & 76ers; The Arizona Diamondbacks; The San Diego Chargers; The Colorado Rockies.

As expanded upon at AlterNet.

Today's Cartoon Question

The Pope Is A Dope

Spotted here.

Over & Done W/

Summer: Gone.

Tea Bagging Turkeys

Fancy-dress ball: When will the candidates start sporting costumes?
Members of the audience cheer at the start of the Fox News/Google GOP Debate
at the Orange County Convention Center on Sept. 22, 2011 in Orlando, Fla.
Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Thursday, September 22, 2011

More Of This Please

If Obama hadn't been such a punk-ass chump we might have seen some instant karma like this in these United Snakes.
SEOUL, Sept. 23 (Yonhap) -- The head of one of the nation's seven savings banks, whose operations were suspended due to capital shortages last week. was found dead in an apparent suicide Friday, police said.

Jeong Gu-haeng, 50-year-old president of Seoul's Jeil 2 Savings Bank, appears to have jumped from his office on the sixth floor of the bank's main office building in central Seoul, police said, as prosecutors raided the head offices of the seven banks in search of clues for possible irregularities by their executives and large shareholders.
But probably not, the American executive class having neither the concept of shame nor anything resembling moral values.

"Now, see my fists? They are getting ready to fuck you up."

If the President or a pig does it, it isn't illegal.
Ramos's attorney, John Barnett, said his client was simply doing his job.

"Officer Ramos did what he was trained to do and he committed no crime," Barnett said in a statement. "He was confronted with a suspect who was combative and refused to comply with his lawful order. He was non-compliant, resisted and set these tragic events in motion. To charge a peace officer with murder under these circumstances is unprecedented and just wrong."

Ramos was held at Orange County Jail in Santa Ana on $1 million bail. He was held in isolation due to death threats.

[...]

Prosecutors say it was Ramos who set in motion the events that led to Thomas's death.

As Ramos snapped on a pair of latex gloves and leaned over a confused Thomas, prosecutors say, his body microphone and surveillance tape captured an angry threat: "Now, see my fists? They are getting ready to [expletive] you up."

"This declaration was a turning point, a defining moment," Rackauckas said, as he announced the charges. "Ramos was telling Kelly Thomas that this encounter had changed from a fairly routine police detention into an impending beating at the hands of an angry police officer."
Too long, don't watch:One need see nothing beyond the chief porker accused in the case:
Manuel Ramos, murderer, courtesy OCDA
Just the size of this literal oinker should indicate the lack of professionalism of the Fullerton force. Disband it now!

Editorial comment: Unless it's done by a policeman or an aristocrat.

FTL Report

"It is a tiny difference," said Ereditato, who also works at Berne University in Switzerland, "but conceptually it is incredibly important. The finding is so startling that, for the moment, everybody should be very prudent."Yes, chill out, eggheads.

Where Will We Be?

Just in time!

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Picking The Nuts

Looking for comedy relief, we dived into the shallow pool of a Martin Peretz exercise. Title: "Obama’s Middle East Is in Tatters, Utter Tatters." First two sentences:
It is not actually his region. Still, with the arrogance that is so characteristic of his behavior in matters he knows little about (which is a lot of matters), he entered the region as if in a triumphal march.
It gets better (for comedy) & worse for anything else (We wonder if Peretz cribs his dirty Arab shtick from Nazi dirty Jew propaganda, merely substituting an ethnic group here & there.)

After wallowing through something like this, it's always wise to read the comments, if only for the "This is why I shall not be renewing my subscription, harrumph!" indications that not even most TNR subscribers buy into Marty's shit.

But we did find something new under the Obama derangement sun: It's not enough that the president is alleged to have been a "Chicago politician." (Where, by the way, is all the evidence that he was a ward-heeler & so on? You'd think someone could have dredged up something by now.) No, it's "Chicago Black politics," & the Islamic influence is outsized!!
I would like to begin with the suggestion that the Democrats nominate someone different for President in 2012, someone not sentimental about his Islamic heritage nor influenced by the outsized influence of Islam on Chicago Black politics.
From "amidut" at 8:03am on 20 Sept., if you must see it for yourself.

Justice?

Even as a guy whose guilt is in question is about to be executed in Georgia, two actual candidates for the needle are charged in a cold-blooded gang murder. (What about the other pigs involved? There were more than two.) Documentation. (And for the pdf.phobic. What's w/ that, anyway?)

Editorial posture: We at Just Another Blog (From L.A.)™ aren't that big on the death penalty, but when murder is committed "under color of authority," as the legal phrase goes, we are all for death to killer cops, as opposed to murdering alleged cop killers.

Joke Of The Day

Click for more.

How Can We Miss Them
If They Won't Go Away?

Mid-tempo chiming/clanging-guitar dull-rockers R.E.M. may have "broken up," probably in a last ditch attempt to get back some of the attention mid-tempo chiming/clanging-guitar dull-rockers U2 (Let's face it, when Henry Rollins says you suck, you suck.) stole from them.

Broken up? Did they even create (If you can call it that.) any music in this millennium?

Perhaps Boner Bonobo & Michael Stipe could be locked in the same room until one of them bores the other to a well-deserved death, or they suck all of the air out of the room.

It's Come To This

Now the Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex, beyond its lust to destroy anything that moves on the other side of the world, would like to insure the deaths of more Americans, rather than insure them a decent life in retirement & illness.

Our Candidate for "Primarying"

Dianne Feinstein (who, per Wiki&c. has never held a "real" job in her life, just gummint jobs & elected offices that somehow allow one to amass money) has US$5,000,000.00 to give to her campaign treasury.

POLITICO claims:
Feinstein is one of the wealthiest members of Congress, with a minimum net worth of at least $45 million, according to her latest annual financial disclosure report. She is married to investor Richard Blum, a hugely successful investment manager. The couple jointly own an interest in the Carlton Hotel in San Francisco worth $5 million to $25 million, and Feinstein herself has several trust funds with at least $1 million in cash.

The couple also owns a Kauai, Hawaii, condominium worth $1 million to $5 million.
It would appear Sen. Mrs. Moneybags made "her" money the old fashioned way, by marrying it. There's a word for that. Several words, actually. Yet certain groups will get pissy if we mention any of them, even if this sort of prostitution is far from any feminist ideal.
Feinstein easily won reelection in 2000 and 2006 after a difficult 1994 race against Republican Michael Huffington. But recent polls have shown her to be vulnerable next year, despite no big-name Republican challenger yet. Feinstein is expected to raise at least $20 million to $25 million for the reelection race.
And let's get ageist: Sen. Feinstein will be 84 at the end of her term if she's reëlected & lives to the end of that term. We don't need one more old & rich-by-marriage person in the Senate, do we?

Especially not a corrupt crony capitalist one:
In 2009 Feinstein was accused of corruption when her husband's real estate company was awarded a lucrative federal agency contract.[26][27]
Dump Dianne '12!

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Magical Non-Thinking

One major caveat emerges, however: Froese noted that American believers add an important religious gloss to these market-driven theories by arguing that God is actually tipping the scales — in their favor, of course — as long as they are hard-working true believers.

“For many Americans, the invisible hand of Adam Smith has become God’s hand,” Froese said.

This kind of economic theology is being trumpeted most effectively by the Republican party, especially GOP presidential hopefuls Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann.

“Political candidates can promote economic conservatism and a lack of government regulation merely by referring to an engaged God,” Froese said. “It works because many rank-and-file voters believe that a lack of government regulation and lower taxes is part of God’s plan.”
Can all of you just shut the fuck up about converting Tea Baggers & the other demon-possessed to anti-corporate, pro-human stances? There is no rational basis to think that any amount of rational explanation of grim reality will extract their heads from their asses. Jesus!

There's A Horse's Patoot ...

As a (more or less) real man we aren't that fond of "the thea-tuh," & of course Broadway musicals w/ ninnies breaking into song for no apparent reason are anathema, abomination & just fucking stupid in the Bouffant book. (Read somewhere that the Japanese agree, & that Hollywood musicals were often exhibited in Japan w/ the pointless musical numbers simply excised. Sometimes we wonder how such a sensible nation lost that little war they started.)

Nonetheless, as an "irreverent celebrity analyst" ourself, we haven't been able to avoid noticing that revivals of Broadway chestnuts (Oklahoma, Gypsy, South Pacific, ad nauseum) were popular w/ the sort of middlebrow fuckwads from fly-over country who go to Manhattan to take in the sights & are willing to pay insane prices to sit still & witness drivel, & that this creative bankruptcy has at last reached the bottom of the creative barrel w/ musical versions of successful movies & comic books, & the hiring of hacks from the popular music world to crank out cheery & disposable musical pablum to placate the punters.

Now they've scraped through the barrel's bottom & are working on the mud below. Case in point:
Deadline reports that Barry Levinson — writer-director of the movie [Diner] that launched his filmmaking career, as well as those of the aforementioned stars — will write the book for the musical, while Sheryl Crow will handle music and lyrics.
We suppose we're saddened that Mr. Levinson has run out of new or interesting ideas, but here's a modest proposal for all hack-meisters: Unless you rammed all your Hollywood money up your snout & really need to put your spoiled offspring through college, give up the mansion/wasteful existence, retire somewhere less expensive & leave humanity the hell alone. Just because people still take your calls doesn't mean you have to continue expressing yourselves. Or breathing. Sheryl Crow? What the hell goes through their minds?

Projection Report

Bonus Quote of the Day
"I think the president has become a pyromaniac in a field of straw men. I think what he wants to do is set up those of us on the other side of the aisle as some caricature and assign policies to us that we don't have and then defeat those arguments."

-- Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), in an interview with Laura Ingraham.
Maybe Randian übermensch Ryan should get that beam out of his eye before remarking on the non-existent mote in the eye of the "Kenyan Muslim socialist fascist usurper America-hating Alinskyite anti-colonialist who stole the White House w/ 52% of the vote." It's in the fucking Bible he claims he's reading.

Free Speech Round-Up

Catholic crybaby Rick Santorum, whose most recent participation in the electoral process led to his losing the U.S. Senate seat from Pennsylvania he held for two terms, has begged search engine giant Google to return to the days of the Index of Prohibited Books.

Why? Because, theo-fascism & certain personality disorders aside,
A Google search for Santorum has generated some inappropriate results since gay columnist Dan Savage organized an online campaign to link graphic sexual terms to the socially conservative senator’s name.

Now, the Republican presidential candidate says he’s convinced Google could do something to remedy the issue, if the company wanted to.

“I suspect if something was up there like that about Joe Biden, they’d get rid of it,” Santorum said. “If you're a responsible business, you don't let things like that happen in your business that have an impact on the country.”
ex-Senator Santorum believes that he could (or should, or something) be having an "impact on the country."

Senator Sanctimonious's current standing in polls
From P.P. Polling
indicates he's not having much of an impact on anything or anyone, anywhere, & if the ex-Senator is so delusional that he believes his being a political joke can be attributed to his being a sex joke on the Internet, we can only hope his impact* on This Great Nation of Ours™ will continue to shrink.
*The reader is invited to imagine something funny about a frothily (or "foaming at the mouth") impacted rectum.

[Editor's Note: Honest, we were too busy scanning TBogg's monster thread to note that he had pulled the same chunk of crap from Politico we had. And don't let posting times fool you. We polish these turds to a fine sheen, & started this item long before his take was available. — M.B.]

Give Guns To The Queers*

In honor of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" becoming history, FEAR:"Let's have a war
Give guns to the queers
Let's have a war
The enemy's within!"

*Yes, we used it again.

Today's Search Keywords

It's not as if we care, but it's vaguely interesting when not completely confusing.

Monday, September 19, 2011

No Strike This Time

LOS ANGELES, CA: NAACP members participating in the NAACP's 102nd annual national convention at the Los Angeles Convention Center join a labor march and rally in front of a Ralphs grocery store on July 27, 2011. Getty Images
We're more than a little sorry that Supermarkeageddon probably won't happen. Would have been especially amusing this time around, because Ralphs & Albertsons (NB: Ralphs, sans apostrophe, is correct: The chain was founded by George Ralphs, while Albertsons, also sans apostrophe, is incorrect, as it was founded by a Joe Albertson!) threatened to close their stores rather than hire scabs. Oh well.
Health insurance benefits were the major point of contention between the two sides. Under the original offer, workers would have paid about $36 per month for individual health insurance, or $92 per month for family coverage.
Let's hope the working people who keep us fat & complacent didn't get totally screwed by the contract, details of which have not been released as of this typing.

What We Got

Above & beyond a delicious dinner in a real restaurant, a snappy shirt:
Granted, a re-gift (too big for our friend & sexual associate) but we gifted her right back w/ all the dyed broccoli that came w/ the meat & Froggy-style potatoes. (Which really were pommes frites, not those soggy excuses up w/ which you Yanks put. Hah!)

Can't forget the big screw. (And a wrench.)
And the conveniently down-sized (our previous one was about three-ft. by four-ft.) reminder to get back to work on world domination.
Besides all the above, all from friend & sexual associate, our non-meat-space friends at World O' Crap must have our big day in a tickler file, 'cause they came through as well.

"You tolerate us, you really tolerate us!"

Also On This Date

Dodger Stadium's ground was broken (1959)
& the "trial" of Emmett Till's murderers began (1955).

The Only $400,000 After Taxes Whiner

Try living on US$14,000 & change, punk.

These assholes are very fortunate we can't afford travel to the shit-holes where they are found. Or enough ammunition. Gasoline is still w/in our reach, however.

Waving The Bloody Flag

Meat-space acquaintance (Don't hold it against him!) Weldon Berger doesn't type for public consumption often enough; when he does it's well worth it.

We've cherry-picked a real hatin' on America part ('cause we're just that way) from a post-10th anniv. of the most-horrible-attack-ever on anything anywhere item:
It was a distant disaster. Not so for everyone, of course, but for a lot of people. I remember reading a letter to the editor of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin from a woman, I think from Michigan, who had been forced to overstay her Hawaii vacation while the flights were grounded. She was resentful because so many businesses in Waikiki weren’t flying American flags in the tragedy’s wake.

The Maddow & The Anti-Maddow

Still can't quite believe The Atlantic employs this whiner, no matter how many YouTube commenters are in full & whining agreement w/ Ms. McArdle.