...and that is why they invented whisky

What Driftglass said.

Seriously, if you are not reading Driftglass regularly, then just what the hell are you doing on the Internet?

How to leave politics forever

Wow. Somebody forgot their jackass medication in the morning.

And that somebody is former Reform/Alliance MP Jim Pankiw. He called a press conference to announce he didn't need the media, that First Nations people are all racists and that he had a tough childhood.

Some highlights from the Regina Leader-Post

"And I'm gonna use the Internet. And my website is how I'm gonna communicate with people and do an end run right around the media. So, the media can misrepresent me all they want, but what I want is equality and that's what I'm gonna get."

When asked why he would call a press conference if he wants to avoid the media, Pankiw said, "I don't know, to rub it in your face. Because I don't need you."

Pankiw went on to say he considers aboriginal people to be racists.

He called attention to a picture of Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations Chief Guy Lonechild in a traditional headdress on the front page of Thursday's StarPhoenix, calling it "a guy with a big headband thing on, like feathers and stuff. Like, if there was a guy with a white sheet with holes in the eyes, wouldn't you say that guy's a racist?" he asked.

Watch the video of the press conference and you can see that Pankiw seems pretty twitchy. I almost expected him go all Bud Dwyer or something. I have to wonder if the reporters in the room could hear an audible ticking sound coming from Pankiw.

Needless to say, Pankiw intends to run as an independant, since even the Conservative Party of Canada wants nothing to do with him. I suspect he's run a solid fifth in a four candidate race when an election is finally called.

A tip of the toque to David over at Jim Dandy Goodness.

Weekend uke blogging-daughters of friends I've never met edition

If you've been reading this or watching this you may know who this is and what she's wearing and why this is so very extremely cool.

Hail Satan, indeed! Rock on bigger E!

The National Post is political propaganda, not journalism

In an irate column Feb. 2, National Post columnist Barbara Kay denounces a letter to the editor penned by Penni Stewart, president of the Canadian Association of University Students, and Katherine Giroux-Bougard, national chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students that justly pointed out the idiocy of a Jan. 26 Post editorial that rejoiced in the demise of “Womens’s Studies programs” (sic). Kay clutches at her pearls and attempts to defend the unsigned editorial, which she very likely penned, and sets out, as usual, to prove that feminists and other liberals are bad. But the column actually vindicates the letter to the editor, because almost every sentence in it confirms that Barbara Kay’s column, and indeed the entire National Post are nothing more than conservative hackery on newsprint, not objective journalism.
She begins with a curious statement about no one at the Post or anywhere else believes that equality between men and women is a “radical idea” and that the authors of the letter have implied that only Women’s studies holds that value, a straw statement of remarkable disingenuousness. Nobody on this blog or anywhere else in their right mind would ignore the fact that vast swathes of the conservative religious community and other assorted douchebags very much consider women to be second-class humans who should be subservient to men, and I, who have often publicly railed against and been lectured about such oppresive sexism, take exception to the implication that even Post readers would be stupid enough to accept such patent nonsense at face value. All columnists at the Post, indeed the entire publication, reeks of this kind of conservative advocacy. Actually, all right-wing-funded institutions, their radio shows, their magazines and their churches believe in more than just inequality, they believe in specifically villifying feminism.
And if there is any nook or cranny in Kay’s writings or the National Post that is not used as a rhetorical platform for attacking progressive forces in society, I would welcome the enlightenment and be the first to give credit where credit is due. On the other hand, I can certainly show Ms. Kay many instances of her hackery and crimes against reason, such as her tendency to wallow in false equivelancies, which completely undercut any point she might try to make in her attempts to spin the facts. It isn’t facts that Kay and the Post are championing, though, it is pounding home conservative talking points. In other words, Barbara Kay and the National Post are merely the media arm of the neoconservative movement, which is nothing more today than a lobby group for wealthy interests, not at all a movement interested in true social, fiscal or environmental conservatism.
Political activism and recruitment to activism should not be the responsibility of newspapers to promote. It is rather “ironic” that Kay tries to argue that the problem with Women’s studies programs is that they are radical and “faith-based” by pointing to an irrelevant to the matter at hand but otherwise valid complaint from the Canadian Association of University Teachers that a university should not be allowed to apply a religious test for employment as it is a violation of academic freedom. She appropriates a line from the complaint that “A university is meant as a place to explore ideas, not to create disciples of Christ.”
How is the conservative bastion of the National Post any different? Writers may not have to sign actual Conservative Party of Canada membership cards, but anyone apply to write at the National Post had better believe in the ideology of neoconservatism, or they can take a hike. The hiring committees grill applicants with a view to exposing their ideological loyalties. Anyone deviating from the politically correct adamantine Rand-imbued party line will not be welcome. Indeed, I am confident that a student in a women’s studies program would be given far greater latitude to challenge the tenets of feminism with impunity than a National Post writer defying the lassiez-faire crypto-fascist doctrines of neoconservatism.*
I am sure, for example, that women’s studies programs do not include on their reading lists any writers who advocate the extermination and religious conversion of liberals and Muslims. Yet conservative publications across North America give pride of place to the odious Anne Coulter, whose mainstream media career died a couple of years ago (and whom we on the left love to drag out to show the batshit craziness of the right). Coulter loathed liberals and vaunted her loathing in her columns, going so far as to advocate blowing up the New York Times and bombing all Muslim nations, an extremist viewpoint that eventually got her booted off CNN. She preached a gospel that incited hatred for liberals who “putridly” sully the landscape of what could be an ideal world if not for their prescence. Coulter is an extreme extreme example of the lack of sense characterizing the conservative movement, but tolerance for her views and others like her that are embraced by the conservative movement point to the unhealthiness at the root of conservatism and its activist arm in the media.
If rich, white, corporatist theocrats want to advance the idea of returning Canada to the 1890s or have the nation run entirely for profit by the private sector, they are free to do so through the political process: Let them join our present parties – the Conservative Party of Canada is entirely at their disposal and there isn’t a ambition the extreme right espouses that is not mirrored in CPC policy- and work to make those changes as all citizens are free to do, or start their own Fascist Party if they think they can get enough people to support them. Which will never happen, since most Canadians understand that neoconservatism is not about freedom, but about giving money and power to the wealthy at the expense of the rest of us.
The National Post is losing money because they are losing readers. The revolution is over. Rationality and compassion won. What is good about conservatism can be written about in other publications. What’s bad is unworthy of a publication of its own. Barbara Kay and The National Post are superfluous in every respect and calling it a necessary balance to the so-called liberal mainstream media won’t disguise that reality. Goodbye, salut, farewell, shalom. Don’t slam the door on the way out.


(* I have no proof that this is true. This is central to my point)

Uppity-date: It seems Ms. Kay doesn't care for my argumentation. A challenge offered and answered!

That's funny, I don't remember anything about "blessed are the ass-kickers" in the Sermon on the Mount

So much for turning the other cheek I guess.

From the New York Times:

Flock Is Now a Fight Team in Some Ministries
MEMPHIS — In the back room of a theater on Beale Street, John Renken, 42, a pastor, recently led a group of young men in prayer.
“Father, we thank you for tonight,” he said. “We pray that we will be a representation of you.”
An hour later, a member of his flock who had bowed his head was now unleashing a torrent of blows on an opponent, and Mr. Renken was offering guidance that was not exactly prayerful.
“Hard punches!” he shouted from the sidelines of a martial arts event called Cage Assault. “Finish the fight! To the head! To the head!”
The young man was a member of a fight team at Xtreme Ministries, a small church near Nashville that doubles as a mixed martial arts academy. Mr. Renken, who founded the church and academy, doubles as the team’s coach. The school’s motto is “Where Feet, Fist and Faith Collide.”

I guess their version of Jesus is the Prince of You-want-a-Piece-of-this? or something like that.


I see they also solicited a comment from Dobson the Younger, though I'm not sure what the hell Christian Fight Club has to do with the man being the "head of the household" unless Mr. Macho is advocating kickboxing the wife into submission. Golly, what do you suppose the odds are of a spike in domestic violence among the attendees of these little faith-based sparring sessions?

His contention that America has "raised a generation of little boys" is pretty funny coming as it does from a leather-jacketed, tattooed, perpetual adolescent who spent his twenties and thirties surfing, skateboarding and championing "X-treme Christianity"and now at forty relies on daddy for his living.

I guess his dad, the head of Focus on the Family, was too busy whipping his Dachshund (and no, that is not a euphemism, but it should be) to teach his son that his head was useful for something other than butting people in the chops.

I guess the meek better not get their hopes up.

"Whitey go home" and other charming Asian proverbs

As annoying as teaching in Japan ever got - and believe me it got plenty annoying - I never had to contend with this kind of crap.

Korea activists target foreign English teachers
A South Korea group uses the Internet and other means to track foreign teachers, in an effort to ferret out illegal or unsavory behavior. The teachers say they're victims of stalkers and rumors.

There are lots of anti-foreigner groups around in Japan, but they don't bother to get quite so focused as these numbskulls in Korea. Mostly they just ride around in big black buses with loudspeakers demanding the people of Japan "Venerate the Emperor and expel the barbarians".

And I'll be the first to admit that there is plenty of unsavory behaviour going on that is related to English conversation schools. Starting with the school management that rip off teachers left, right and center in complete violation of the labour laws (but since the Japanese court system could take ten years to process your claim - and foreign devils rarely win - you might as well just suck it up). Yes, there are teachers who sleep with students and do drugs and drink their brains out every night - almost as many as in the regular Japanese school system. And don't lets get started on the number of people who take English lessons as a way of meeting foreigners to date or the student who stalk teachers or the large number of complete wackos some school's sign up.
I used to work at a school that sold lessons on credit that had a neighbouring branch in a large building just one floor below a mental health clinic. Lots of people would get off the elevator on the wrong floor and the school friendly staff of attractive young men and women - always under pressure to make their sales quota - were more than happy to sign them up for a package of lessons and then send them to our branch. No, there is nothing like being trapped in a glass broom closet with a schizophrenic who is off his medication and want to show you his karate kata or a delusional manic depressive who can't decide whether she desperately wants to have sex with all the teachers (male and female) or thinks they are all harrassing her.
Add to that the special classes of students who are studying English just to have someone to talk to, or as therapy for some sort of antisocial disorder, or who are just plain kooky --- or my personal favorite: students who study English so they can complain about how nasty foreigners are screwing up the country to the foreigners in their own language.
Don't get me wrong, the nuts only make up about 10% of the students I had, and I had some absolutely fantastic students of all ages and backgrounds here in Tokyo, but I don't really miss teaching.
As for the South Korean Foreign Virtue Police, they can bite me.

The parent responsible can be found between "morocco" and "morose"

Via the General (who got it from Joe. My. God.) we learn of a new contender for the Barbara Kay pearl-clutching crown.

Menifee school officials remove dictionary over term 'oral sex'

Monday, January 25, 2010
By JULISSA McKINNON The Press-Enterprise
Read an update to this story
After a parent complained about an elementary school student stumbling across "oral sex" in a classroom dictionary, Menifee Union School District officials decided to pull Merriam Webster's 10th edition from all school shelves earlier this week.
School officials will review the dictionary to decide if it should be permanently banned because of the "sexually graphic" entry, said district spokeswoman Betti Cadmus. The dictionaries were initially purchased a few years ago for fourth- and fifth-grade classrooms districtwide, according to a memo to the superintendent.
"It's just not age appropriate," said Cadmus, adding that this is the first time a book has been removed from classrooms throughout the district.
"It's hard to sit and read the dictionary, but we'll be looking to find other things of a graphic nature," Cadmus said. She explained that other dictionary entries defining human anatomy would probably not be cause for alarm.

"Graphic nature?" Wowsers! - let's have a look at what Merriam-Webster's has to say for itself.

oral sex n (1973): oral stimulation of the genitals: CUNNILINGUS, FELLATIO These are a few of my faaaa-vorite things! (Ed: Stop that! no singing, no sniggering!)

Whew! is it hot in here or what? Anyone thinks of that as "sexually graphic" probably thinks of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue as hard core pornography. (Ed: Keep using those key search words, think of the traffic!)

The first thing kids do when handed a dictionary for the first time is to look up every so-called dirty word they can find. Admittedly, the full-on Merriam-Webster's Collegiate might not be the optimal choice for first graders, but these are fourth and fifth graders we are talking about. I have one of those and he stays up and watches television past 8 p.m. In North America that would mean he's seen television commercials for boner pills, tampons and watched sitcoms. I betcha he's even heard some of the seven words you used to not be allowed to say on television. Actually, I know he has - he's seen me watch the news a few times. It's one of the reasons I wasn't allowed to watch any of the U.S. presidential campaign debates at home since the first Bush-Kerry debate in 2004. Mind you, he hasn't really heard the best stuff yet since we haven't had occasion to do any carpentry work together yet. But I digress slightly.

If the powers that be in Stupidville Menifee Union School District out in California are so easily bullied by a single irate parent, where will this end? I'm guessing this is the kind of district where the kids are not allowed anything but plastic sporks in the lunch room and little boys who make the thumb-up-index-finger-extended-from-fist gesture while saying "bang, bang" are sent to the school shrink and kindergarten kids must pass through a metal detector and close body search before entering school grounds. What do they do if a kid farts, suspend them for "obscene behavior"?

Their school libraries must be a treat. I'm guessing no occult-promoting Harry Potter or even ghost stories, no stories that depict violence (like every detective story ever written, most history books and the Bible), nothing vulgar (good bye Capt. Underpants and Judy Blume) nothing that might suggest evolution is more correct than creationism (farewell Origin of Species and all biology texts) or that suggests -- I suspect it's probably a broom closet with a copy of the local White Pages and a couple of old Dick and Jane books.

Once you start taking out the dictionaries for not being age-appropriate, how do the kids advance their vocabularies beyond their current reading level? Where does the censorship end?
After all, almost any word can be dirty if you say it right.

More bullshit from Rideau Hall

While it may just be the latest shiny object to be dangled in front of the public to keep them distracted from Stephen Harper's prorogation shenanigans and the response from both the electorate and the opposition until the big Burning Stick Festival in Vancouver next month, I still think this is unfair, hypocritical and just plain mean-spirited.

Cancer runner Steve Fonyo stripped of Order of Canada
The Canadian Press
VANCOUVER — He finished Terry Fox's run across Canada and raised millions for cancer research, but in the two decades since then his life has been marked by run-ins with the law.
Now Rideau Hall has revoked Steve Fonyo Jr.'s membership in the Order of Canada, one of the country's highest civilian honours.
Fonyo, an amputee like Fox, was awarded the order in 1985 after raising more than $13 million. It was recognition of his 14-month, 8,000-kilometre trek on an artificial leg along the Trans-Canada Highway, completing the epic journey Fox had planned from St. John's, NL, to Victoria.
Owing to a slew of criminal convictions, however, the 44-year-old was stripped of the award on Dec. 10. A notice of the revocation appeared in the Canada Gazette on Jan. 23.
Fonyo, then of Vernon, B.C., was named The Canadian Press Newsmaker of the Year in 1985, but his stretch of inspirational stories eventually took a negative turn.
The one-time hero, who lost his leg to bone cancer at age 12, battled cocaine addiction and depression.

The story goes on to describe Fonyo's various convictions for petty drug offenses, assault, check-kiting and drunken driving. CTV ran a response from Fonyo a day later - he spoke to them by telephone from jail.

Admittedly Fonyo has not lead an exemplary life since he was awarded the Order at age 18, but he was not given the award for the life he was going to lead or for his ongoing contributions to Canada - he was given the award for finishing what Terry Fox started, running across the country on an artificial leg to raise awareness of and money for cancer research.

Compare his case to this one:

Mountie who admitted sexually assaulting teen will receive bravery
medal

The Governor General's office says an Alberta Mountie who has admitted sexually assaulting a teenage girl will still receive a national award for bravery.

By Calgary Herald
September 4, 2008

CALGARY - The Governor General’s office says an Alberta Mountie who has admitted sexually assaulting a teenage girl will still receive a national award for bravery.
Guy Armand Raes of Airdrie was recently named a recipient of the Governor
General’s Star of Courage award.
On Wednesday, a week after the announcement, Raes was in front of a provincial court judge pleading guilty to sexually assaulting a teen he befriended through an RCMP investigation. He will be sentenced next week.
Raes, 50, helped rescue a young couple and guided other residents to safety during a massive row house fire in Airdrie, a residential community just north of Calgary, in August 2005. The court case has no bearing on Raes’s award, according to the Governor General’s office.
“He is being recognized for an act of bravery that happened in 2005,” said Marie-Paule Thorn, spokeswoman for the Governor General’s office.

Now, to be honest, I think that Mr. Raes should keep his Star of Courage award. As the GG's spokewoman says, the award is about a specific deed that he performed in 2005 and no matter what he did afterwards, that deed stands alone. The same could be said to be true for Steve Fonyo - as an 18 year old he set out to run across the country and raise money for cancer research, finishing the job Terry Fox could not. He spent 14 months of his life accomplishing this astonishing feat, raised nearly $14 million dollars for cancer research and inspired the nation. Has he lived an exemplary life since then? No. So what? His troubled life since then does not in any way diminish his accomplishment and it is for that accomplishment the Order of Canada was awarded.

I'll admit the rules do say the order can be stripped from those who are "convicted of a Crime in Canada or if the conduct of the person has otherwise brought dishonour to the Order. A person can also be removed from the Order if his or her personal conduct in public departs significantly from recognized standards and is seen as undermining the credibility, integrity, or relevance of the Order; if his or her conduct is a departure from what they have accomplished to be appointed to the Order; or if they have been subjected to an official sanction by an adjudicating body, professional association, or other organization."

So, what about this guy?

A distinguished Toronto entrepreneur and publisher, he is a man of diverse achievements within the realms of Canadian commerce, education, literature and the arts. In addition to his various business ventures, which have enhanced Canada's visible presence internationally, he is well known for his generous support of many charitable endeavours, notably the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry.

Or this guy:

An entrepreneur and a risk-taker, he revolutionized film presentation and distribution in Canada and has also made an invaluable contribution to the growth of theatrical production in this country. His operation of an historic Toronto theatre and another in North York has raised the standards of commercial theatre and provided new opportunities for Canadian talent in an industry which, through his influence, has become a respected player in the international marketplace.

Whoops, both of them are in jail over illegal deeds they committed in the area for which they were given the Order of Canada, and one of them renounced his citizenship to accept foreign honors just a decade after he was named to the order- why haven't they been stripped of their awards the way fellow fraudster Alan Eagleson was?

There are only two other people who have been stripped of the award:

Aboriginal leader David Ahenakew lost his membership in 2005 after being convicted of promoting hatred against Jews. He was later acquitted of the charge after an appeal.

*Lawyer and race-relations advocate T. Sher Singh lost his membership in 2008 after the Law Society of Upper Canada found him guilty of professional misconduct and revoked his license to practice law.

Chief Ahenakew's conduct was appalling and he was revealed to be an anti-Semite even though he was convicted of the charges against him initially, he was aquitted on appeal. T. Sher Singh was never even indicted for any crimes as far as I know, simply disbarred for professional misconduct, a far cry from being jailed for committing fraud in the course of the very thing for which one is being honored.

The GG's office is technically within its rights to strip Fonyo of his award, but if they do so, Black and Drabinsky had better be immediately stripped of theirs too, along with a number of other people who may have brought dishonor to the Order, or is accepting envelopes full of cash in hotel rooms and selling your influence an acceptable practice to the GG?

All TV news stories are exactly the same

At least a thousand words

This is the best Canadian political photo since Robert Stanfield dropped the football.

h/t to Dammit Janet and photographer Matthew Rossi

Very early Friday Uke blogging- a commission by an old friend

This is the splendiferous Rayne, the daughter (!!!!) of an old drinking buddy from the Sault. The sound quality is a bit rough, but the mountains of raw talent more than make up for it.

And yes, there are those who know me as Bernice -- it's a long story, but don't get your hopes up, it has nothing to do with surgery or cross dressing.

Sound quality issues aside, I have one other problem with this video and that is Rayne herself. She claims to be the daughter of an old friend of mine know as "Fish" and this whole thing sounds "fishy" ( you see what I did there?). Without meaning any disrespect for Rayne and not wanting to sound creepy and dirtyoldmanish - She is gorgeous as well as talented. My point being, she's way too pretty to be Fish's daughter. Also, Fish and I used to make fools of ourselves trying to meet girls like who looked like her, so clearly she is too old to be Fish's daughter, because if she is his daughter that would make him old. And if he's old, that would make me old. And that is just not going to happen.

Whomever's daughter she is, we hope Rayne makes her dad buy her a new microphone so she can make more uke videos.

I got your class war right here

Give a man a fish and he'll eat it, teach a man to fish....and he may starve to death waiting to get a bite.

There has been a lot of asinine talk lately about the evils of creating dependence among the poor by...well, y'know, making sure that they don't starve to death. My previous favorite were entitlement-crazed assholes like these on the right who felt that sending money to Haiti would just encourage people there to remain poor. It's funny that no one thought of how the Haitians were encouraging the French to be poor while they were paying reparations for freeing themselves from slavery between 1804 and 1947.

But my new favorite in the "I hope one day your car breaks down in the slums you helped create" sweepstakes is South Carolina Lt. Gov. and gubernatorial hopeful Andre Bauer who thinks the poor are a bunch of ungrateful layabouts breeding like the vermin he thinks they are because of school lunch programs.

GREENVILLE - Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer has compared giving people government assistanc to "feeding stray animals."

Bauer, who is running for the Republican nomination for governor, made his remark during a town hall meeting in Fountain Inn that included state lawmakers and about 115 residents.

"My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed. You're facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce especially ones that don't think too much further than that. And so what you've got to do is you've got to curtail that type of behavior. They don't know any better," Bauer said.

In South Carolina, 58 percent of students participate in the free and reduced-price lunch program.

Yes, Mr. Bauer, by all means deny aid to the children of irresponsible poor parents, that will teach them a lesson! And if little Johnny and Janey can't attend school because they are out dumpster diving to get enough to eat or can't concentrate at school because they didn't have breakfast and can't afford lunch, well then I guess they will learn not to be poor -- certainly it won't reinforce the cyclical nature of poverty and make more poor people. That would be unthinkable in a state as prosperous and egalitarian as yours

• According to statistics collected by the South Carolina Appleseed Legal Justice Center, (cribbed from the comments but tracked down to the linked source above)

  
  

  South Carolina ranks 45th in overall child wellbeing today.

  26% of children under the age of 6 years old lives in poverty.

  1 in 10 children live in extreme poverty.

  In 2006, 38% of babies were born to mothers who lacked adequate prenatal care.

  Infant mortality: 47th

  High school grad: 48th

  Obesity: 45th

  Infectious diseases: 42nd

  Violent crime: 50th (highest)

  Lack of health insurance: 37th

  Premature deaths: 46th

  Mental health: 41st

  Per capita income: 45th

  Underemployment: 46th

And what is this little tidbit of info?

Per dollar of federal tax collected in 2005, South Carolina citizens received approximately $1.35 in the way of federal spending. This ranks the state 16th highest nationally and represents a slight rise from 1995, when South Carolina received $1.20 per dollar of taxes in federal spending, ranking it 18th highest nationally.

hmmm, maybe the U.S. federal government should stop feeding South Carolina?

Aw, shit...

Yeah, I know people are dying in Haiti and Afghanistan and Iraq and Sudan and plenty of other places, but I didn't look at pictures of them every Thursday for the last several years.
For Beckham and the Tbogg clan

The Power of the Dog
by Rudyard Kipling

There is sorrow enough in the natural way
From men and women to fill our day;
And when we are certain of sorrow in store,
Why do we always arrange for more?
Brothers and sisters, I bid you beware
Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.

Buy a pup and your money will buy
Love unflinching that cannot lie--
Perfect passsion and worship fed
By a kick in the ribs or a pat on the head.
Nevertheless it is hardly fair
To risk your heart to a dog to tear.

When the fourteen years which Nature permits
Are closing in asthma, or tumour, or fits,
And the vet's unspoken prescription runs
To lethal chambers or loaded guns,
Then you will find--it's your own affair--
But ... you've given your heart to a dog to tear.

When the body that lived at your single will,
With its whimper of welcome, is stilled (how still!)
When the spirit that answered your every mood
Is gone--wherever it goes--for good,
You will discover how much you care,
And will give your heart to a dog to tear.

We've sorrow enough in the natural way,
When it comes to burying Christian clay.
Our loves are not given, but only lent,
At compound interest of cent per cent.
Though it is not always the case, I believe,
That the longer we've kept 'em, the more do we grieve:
For, when debts are payable, right or wrong,
A short-term loan is as bad as a long--
So why in Heaven (before we are there)
Should we give our hearts to a dog to tear?

Return of the son of Friday Ukulele Blogging

Five years old and he's already better than I am.

Democracy, a wholly owned subsidiary of Giganto-corp!

Shorter U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts: "I, for one, welcome our new corporate overlords!"

"Corporations have neither bodies to kick or souls to damn"

-Andrew Jackson

Things that suck

A little dated but I think the message here is still valid. Honestly, how do the Democrats lose the Kennedy family seat in the Senate to some teabagging, nude-posing pretty boy?

Meanwhile, in other things that suck, Haiti just had another major earthquake, Kate McGarrigle has died -who would have thought she'd be best known as Rufus' Mom? - and Spenser creator Robert B. Parker has died.

I'll be at the bar if anyone needs me....

Crazy by any other name is still crazy

Amid Haiti's decent into Hell, we see our old friends Pat "Gays caused 9/11" Robertson and Rush "Take the bone out of your nose" Limbaugh once again overflowing with the rancid milk of compassionate conservatism.

From CNN:

Robertson, the host of the "700 Club," blamed the tragedy on something that "happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it."
The Haitians "were under the heel of the French. You know, Napoleon III and whatever," Robertson said on his broadcast Wednesday. "And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, 'We will serve you if you will get us free from the French.' True story. And so, the devil said, 'OK, it's a deal.' "
Native Haitians defeated French colonists in 1804 and declared independence.
"You know, the Haitians revolted and got themselves free. But ever since, they have been cursed by one thing after the other."

Video here


Not to be outdone, Limbaugh, the secular Tweedledum to Robertson's Tweedledee, said the whole Trying-to-save-some-lives-Haiti thing was just a political stunt by Barack Obama:

From TPM

Limbaugh, on the other hand, suggested that the Obama administration would use contributions to the Red Cross to gather information about donors.
"Would you trust that the money is going to go to Haiti?" Limbaugh said. "Would you trust that your name is going to end up on a mailing list for the Obama people to start asking you for campaign donations for him and other causes?"
He also said Obama was so quick to begin assistance to Haiti in order to boost his "credibility with the black community, in the both light-skinned and dark-skinned black community in this country."

Now, I've calmed down sufficiently since first reading these comments that I no longer advocate nailing Pat Robertson's testicles to a plank and nailing the plank to a slow moving train crawling through Port-Au-Prince, though I think the Rude Pundit might be onto a good way to make the gruesome twosome of some use.

I've argued elsewhere (comment 32) that everyone has their role to play in society, even if only as a bad example - In the case of Rush Limbaugh for instance, we at least have a walking, waddling, talking, bloviating, living specimen of the perfect braying asshole, a textbook example of the kind of person you can point to and say to your kids, "Don't ever be like that."

Reasonable people can disagree as to whether Rush's mouth should, in the immortal words of Wammo, simply be filled in with cement -- I know, there's that whole "freedom of speech" thing to consider, but in the case of Pat Robertson I have to ask: If his constantly hyperoffensive comments weren't couched in religious terms, wouldn't he be in an institution by now?

How crazy does someone have to be before the authorities come around and throw a net over them? If he were blaming the earthquake in Haiti on giant cockroaches from Venus or claiming the voices in his head were those of the mole-people living under Idaho communicating with him telepathically, he would have been put away by now in a little room and dress in a nice white coat with extra-long sleeves. But since he ties all his crazy to Jesus and has managed to convince a bunch of idiots to send him a lot of money, our society doesn't consider him mentally ill.

It seems as long as you claim it's a matter of religious belief, you can pretty much do or say whatever you want, whether it's marry a half-dozen 15-year-olds, beat your spouse, refuse to eat pork, eschew the use of technology, keep and handle poisonous snakes or wage war to ethnically cleanse a patch of desert you claim is promised to you in your holy book. No one dares to call you crazy, no one is allowed to snicker at your heartfelt belief that the position of the entrails of the dead bird foretell the future or that the bread and wine magically become the body of a long dead teacher.

As long as you can tie your particular brand of crazy to a religion, you aren't a fruitcake, you're a "person of faith."

Don't misunderstand me, I don't necessarily think that anyone who believes in a god or gods is necessarily crazy or that all religious belief must be stamped out - I'm merely questioning why the western notion of religious freedom that originally meant that the state would not dictate
which church you wouldl be forced to attend or ban minority religions has somehow come to be a free pass for all manner of anti-social behavior. I don't care if your religion tell you not to eat shellfish or get an abortion or have your body put up on a pillar to eaten by vultures when you die, but as soon as your beliefs start to impinge on others, whether through denying blood transfusions to children too young to make a properly informed decision or harrassing people entering Red Lobster (or Planned Parenthood) or banning books from libraries because they contain words or ideas that offend your religious sensibilities or burning "witches" --your right to religious tolerance ends.

Do you think Al-Quaida would be able to recruit people to blow themselves up for purely secular reasons? Would society have put up with an organization that protected serial child-rapists if that organization had been a network of peewee hockey leagues instead of the Catholic Church? Why is it that celebrity pastor Rick Warren's megachurch doesn't have to pay taxes whether it makes a profit or not, but the Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders must prove they aren't turning a profit in order to keep their tax-free status?

Some would argue that religious organizations of whatever denomination or affliation offer spiritual and emotional comfort to people in their lives, but, I would argue, so do distilleries, movie theaters, brothel and the Grateful Dead. Why should churches get a tax break?

If some guy in the park tell you he gets radio messages in his head from the 23rd dimension or that he hears the voice of Nicolai Tesla or Napoleon in his head telling him to do things, or that he can give people he doesn't like cancer just by thinking about it or put a curse on you, you rightly assume that he is probably schizophrenic or suffering from some other form of mental illness. But George Bush, the Pope and Pat Robertson - and thousands, if not millions, of others - all claim to that god has spoken to them and that He has answered their prayers or guided their actions or cured someone's illness at their request and they are respected, even lauded, for their faith and piety.

It is enough to make one question our societal commitment to science and reason.

"One man's theology is another man's belly laugh"
-Robert Heinlein

Still, it is reassuring to see that some people have their priorities in order. What a fiend we have in Jesus!

Play it again, comrade

Michael Moriarity, while a decent actor, is well known to be a bit squirrelly. He has apparently stopped taking his medication or something and gone full-on, bull-goose, don't-make-eye-contact-as-you-back-away-from-him looney. Here, he has an extended conversation with the voices in his head about why "Casablanca" is communist propaganda and how this explains why the United States is now a communist workers republic.
No, really, he says that and more, oh so much more.

The day the music died

The other guitar player is Lee Atwater, and no, this is not photoshopped. I remember thinking the night I saw the two of them playing together on Letterman, "okay, either the counter-culture is officially dead or someone put acid in this beer."

How to make enemies

I'm guessing the debate this billboard stimulated among working mothers was whether to burn the billboard down first or to leave it until after they had tarred and feathered the idiot who thought putting it up was a good idea.