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Thursday, August 27, 2009

Poor Babies...



Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. -- Albert Einstein

Awww....did some big mean intellectual come and smoosh your dreams for a theocratic right wing paradise?

I know it makes you sad, and I wish I could make it all better. But you see, you HAD your turn to play with our society. Now the big kids get a turn, and you will just have to take your Kool-Aid box and go watch Teletubbies. What? No the purple one isn't gay. Kid's think the dumbest things sometimes.

Huh? Your little friend says that we are ALL wrong and that the big kids are mean "doodie heads"? And it's not their turn because she says their leader isn't from this neighborhood?



Well she DEFINITELY looks like she knows what she's talking about! Why, just look at that law degree she got with her Fruity Pebbles proofs of purchase. That's adorable.

Ok, but it's seriously time to come inside for your nap.. What? What do you mean they are going to ruin the playground while you are inside? You guys were the ones who messed it up, remember? Your little friend Georgie decided to play GI Joe with the kids across the way and melted all of their figures because they "kinda looked like" the kids who spray painted the swing-set? We're still paying for that you know! But at least the big kids will find the brats who originally caused the problem in the first place.

Don't worry the playground is in better hands now. But it's nap time and you know how cranky you get when..huh? What do you mean "God" says it's still your turn to play?



God doesn't take sides on the playground. And we don't care what little Stevie thinks of the big kids' leader. Didn't we catch him salting snails last week? Besides, he only reads the mean parts of the bible anyway so he pretty much hates everything. Especially snails. We really wish his mommy and daddy didn't hit him so much, but we love him anyway.

You are really asking for a time out, I have been more than patient with you! You had your chance to play and look what you did! We caught you torturing other kids, making fun of others because they are poorer than you, the playground has never been this dirty before yet you say it's "naturally" like that, you kids are brats plain and simple!

And if you don't come inside for your nap, I'll be forced to get out the paddle! Maybe if you are good, you can have another chance to be in charge, but you blew it this time! You don't play well with others, you are dirty, you have really bad manners, and you think that God only listens to you. Why would God take the side of a spoiled brat? It's time to move on, and it's time for you to come inside for your nap!

You don't own the playground. Just be happy the big kids are willing to clean up your mess!

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Well You Didn't Keep Your End of the Bargain....

I tried to be nice...

I withheld my postings for over a year despite a heated election, a republican VP candidate ripe for every dumb person joke in the book, a cryass yet righteous defeat on your part, and the laughable elements of your party saying our new squeaky clean President was actually a Kenyan.

I can't keep quiet anymore...there is just too much stupidity in the air and it sure smells like conservatism on the march. The final straw was yesterday when I had the odious opportunity to see your dumber side truly show it's ass yet once more!

Here we have an Israeli national talking up his country's national health care system and the fact that they do more than hold a mattress sale on their memorial day for their veterans. I don't really support alot of Isreal's policies, especially towards the Palestinians in Gaza, but respect for the soldiers who follow orders is important in any society.

Then all of a sudden from somewhere in the crowd a complete idiot screams "Heil Hitler!"...at an Israeli Jew. When the poor guy calls her out on it and explains he isn't there to support Obama, we see a couple of right wing goons come in to protect their erstwhile genius. Then the guy goes farther and says he once had to go to the emergency room in the States and was given an $8000.00 bill for the visit. Then the woman further shows her ass and starts to mock cry at the man with a oh-so-mature "waaahhhh".



How quickly we forget the dark days of the Bush / Cheney occupation when the slightest show of dissent was greeted with arrest and prosecution. There's the story of the couple who were arrested just for wearing an anti-Bush t-shirt at a rally. And this wasn't one depicting Bush as Hitler, it just had the word Bush in a circle with a line through it a-la Ghostbusters. And that's just one example of the ACTUAL fucking tyranny we lived in for eight mind numbing years. There are more examples here, here, and here! What about the lovely Dixie Chicks almost losing their well earned careers just for practicing THEIR 1st Amendment rights?

Our side never ran around at town halls with pictures of Bush as Hitler and we had more than a leg to stand on with the issue. Quite frankly, it seemed too easy a target when you see quotes like this...


The real problem with the Progressive side is that we let way too much slide in the name of fairness, conservatives don't have that capacity as whatever amino acid in the brain governs rational and fair thought is either simply missing or dried out after too much Faux news. And since the election we have pretty much stayed quiet while the tea bagger and birther crowd has made a concerted effort to dumb down the national discourse with misinformation and idiotic distraction.

Not any more...

The sleeping giant is awake once again. Myself and others' patience has officially run out and the gloves are off. The title of my blog is Righteous Dissent and even though that which I dissent against is no longer in power, my services are needed now more than ever. A good sign of this is Rep. Barney Frank's smackdown of an asshat conservative at his town hall yesterday.



Amen...

I close this long ass post with song I dedicate to the right wing of the United States from a group of brave young women who know full well the hypocrisy flying around right now and the damage it can do...

Tuesday, January 1, 2008

A Rant for the New Year

Check it out guys, we're all Americans no matter how much we bicker and try to force our opinions into how we see this country should be run. And since we're a nation that has historically grown from debate and compromise when applied to internal relations,I propose to you conservatives the following...
1.) You can have your assault rifles, elephant guns, shotguns...hell have some grenades. IF our college kids can smoke their pot without having to worry about you guys beating their doors down and destroying their lives.
2.) You can throw out Roe Vs. Wade and make abortion illegal. IF You can finally let this country have what EVERY other industrialized country has : Full health care for every man, woman, and child. The trauma wards are going to be busy anyway from the first part of the previous compromise. Also all males should relinquish authority on their own bodies for a required period of one month per year. This would involve un needed surgeries and amputations and / or mutilations for the period of the entire month, the specifics to be determined at random by a board of female officials. We can be gentlemen and not hypocrites right? The good thing is it will be paid for.
3.) You can keep your delusions of the smartness in regards to going into Iraq for no damn good reason. IF You repect the fact that alot of people disagree with you. And they're not traitors..... Any armchair strategist can tell you this war just opened our legs to a nasty nutshot from Iran (an ACTUAL terrorist state).

Finally as a token of good faith, we offer Alec Baldwin as a hostage. In return, we want Ann Coulter (see to it that she's bathed).

Whaddaya say my American brethren and sistren....can it be done??!!!

Thursday, December 27, 2007

News With Voltaire Volume 2




Voltaire (François Marie Arouet, 1694-1778) was a French philosopher credited with influencing many of the founding fathers of our country. The picture above is more or less there for two reasons; one it just looks effing cool and two it nicely sums up the philosophy of the man whose writings I've come to admire.

Here is the second installment of News with Voltaire!

"The secret of being boring is to say everything."

"Animals have these advantages over man: they never hear the clock strike, they die without any idea of death, they have no theologians to instruct them, their last moments are not disturbed by unwelcome and unpleasant ceremonies, their funerals cost them nothing, and no one starts lawsuits over their wills."


"If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him."


And rounding it out with an oldie but a goody....

"Anything too stupid to be said is sung."

Monday, December 24, 2007

Top Ten B.M.F. Moments in American History


Untitled Document
Top Ten B.M.F. Moments in American History

We Americans have been given a bad rap lately because after a crisis, we placed our trust in the untrustworthy. But like all the other harrowing moments and / or lapses in our history, this too shall pass. Until then, here are ten historical reminders we can use as sign posts on our way back home. I think we'll find out that it's not that far of a walk.


1. The Boston Tea Party



Not everybody likes tea. And alot of people who don't like it are usually afraid to say it because it might make them look less civilized. But lets be honest with ourselves, it's grass soaked hot water that some explorer presented to some monarch who then in turn forced it down the population's throats. When our forefathers were told that not only was this hoity toity crap going to be forced down their throats as well, but they would also have to pay an extra tax for it; they committed an act of dissent that even Muhatma Ghandi used as inspiration. They dressed up as the least "civilized" people they knew and chucked it off the ships. They didn't do this to frame the Indians, they did it as a statement saying, "We're ALL 'savages' over here, so don't be sending us any more herbs unless they're for smokin'!" For a fictional account of what transpired the next day, check this out.



2. The Declaration of Independence



Penned mostly in a bar on 100% hemp paper, is the best "Dear John" letter given to a monarch since the Magna Carta. Each man who put his signature on this document knew he was potentially signing his own death warrant. Treason wasn't a crime the crown took lightly, and George III was a crazy bastard. Yet living on this side of the ocean, far away from the stink of monarchy and with very little supervision, we concocted a new idea. How about we create a country where people are subject to themselves and not some inbred bafoon with a shiny hat? What if we further that thought and assume that the human being is given certain rights that can't be taken away just because one person is a butthole descended from a long line of buttholes? What would happen if we let the people govern themselves? Well this is what happens....read on!!



3. Our Revolution and That Badass Snake Flag



In the late 1700's, Great Britain was one of the largest superpowers the world had ever seen up to that point. The battle hardened army of King George III had seen action all over the planet and was reputed to be invincible. And the Blackwa....I mean Hessian mercenaries that came with them were known for their cruelty and barbarism. Yet with all this sophistication and reputation, they still insisted on fighting an army of farmers and hunters in the forest while wearing bright red uniforms. They cried "no fair" when our marksmen picked off their officers from the trees, thereby giving birth to the art of sniping. The inevitable victory against these monarch humpers didn't come easily, and we got help from the French in the end to hold them still while we whaled on them. We've since paid that debt back two fold (see # 8). And the whole time, we were using this badass snake flag to show our intent, "step on us, and your ass is bit!"



4. The Barbary Pirate Campaign



Since the early middle ages, the Barbary Pirates were a bane to all who sailed into the Mediterranean. If not payed tribute, they would capture your ship, behead or torture to death it's commander and officers in front their crew, and enslave the rest. So all counties who engaged in trade in the Mediterranean usually complied with the tribute thing and chalked it up to the price of doing business. Then we came along. After Jefferson was elected President, he ceased our share of the tribute and deferred protests and questions of his new policy to "deez nuts" when approached by the envoy from Tripoli. The resulting 4 year war scored as follows: The United States Navy and Marine Corps: 3 killed / 3 wounded / 2 Ships Lost. Barbary Pirates: 800 Dead /1200 Wounded / 4 Metric Assloads of Ships Lost. To this day, descendants of the Barbary Pirates occasionally feel sharp stings to their backsides randomly and seemingly without cause. So this was the first time in our history, we said "you're welcome" to the rest of the world and went about our merry way. It wouldn't be the last....



5. The Old West



Freedom rules. But much like donuts, too much of a good thing can often bloat you and cloud your judgment. This is how it was during our westward expansion. Lack of any honest authority figures coupled with a largely uneducated population made for some pretty interesting scenarios. For example, in a free society, self expression is a right we all have that cannot be infringed upon. So then does it follow, that if my buddy cheats me at poker and I shoot him point blank in the face, I am protected by my rights to express my disdain for dishonorable gamesmanship? After all, liberty was a new concept. At less than 100 years into it, the free world as we know it was going through it's Cambrian Era, and the question of whether it's okay to shoot your friend in the face out of self expression came up quite a bit. A few thousand public hangings later, the general population got this new freedom thing sorted out. This was a time when Good, Evil, and Neutral all made appearances and asked questions that we are still answering today. A definite B.M.F. Moment in our history.



6. Nikola Tesla's Mad Genius



During a time when everything that we consider to be modern was being invented, this guy was getting his ideas stolen by the grumpy old man he worked for. Even though he was an ethnic Serb born in Croatia, he considered himself a patriotic American. When he was finally unleashed from Edison and given the ability to fly on his own, he came up with the technology that eventually led to the internet, cell phones, neon signs, radio, television, electric cars, robotics, better x rays, and of course particle beams. There are a couple of reasons he became just a footnote in your high school history class. The first one is he devised a way for everyone on the planet to have free electricity and information by using specially designed transmitter arrays that would be non polluting and a cinch to maintain. The second is that he actually DID invent a freaking death ray that scared the hell out of everyone so much, that they ridiculed him into obscurity. Today he the only single person on this list of B.M.F. Moments in American history, and all American geeks today can trace their social lineage directly to Nick. Thanks, buddy!



7. The Goddamn Airplane



Yeah, people had hot air balloons. But the Wright brothers saw that as human float, not human flight and decided to give us what we really wanted. So it came to pass that a couple of bicycle geeks with alot of time and not yet broken bones on their hands eventually gave rise to the airplane. Even though there were many attempts that would clearly qualify today as an extra season of Jackass, the crazy bastards did it. "Hi, I'm Orville Wright, and this is the aero-plane!" was often announced to reporters at the sites just before test flights. This was further reinforced by his brother Wilbur, who would add "Yeah dude!" with both thumbs extended. After each horrific crash, they would go over the physics and math in the back of the ambulance before shock, hemorrhaging, and / or blood loss made Orville have to take a break for a while. Eventually though, their efforts paid off and our country became the first culture to embrace the Air Show.



8. Kicking Germany's Ass and Saving France's not Once, but Twice in 25 Years



While compiling this list, I wanted to shy away from the war aspect of our history. Contrary to how it may look sometimes, Americans are actually pretty peaceful people. In fact we had no desire to enter into either of two wars that forced us to kick Germany's ass and save France's (twice), but we got forced into them by military sucker punches. And as peaceful as we are at heart, if you really make the effort piss us off, we usually win whatever war we are in with you. It was already starting to get personal when Hitler decided to attack our mother country, the since forgiven and still beloved Great Britain. And if you know anything about American boys, you know not to mess with our momma. Military strategists all say that it's almost impossible to win a two front war. Yet we had the Empire of Japan, who hadn't been defeated in a war....ever, on one side. And on the other side we had the Nazi war machine who had already conquered most of Europe. We and our honorable British allies charged into this two front war and the ass kicking we laid out was so catastrophic that we still see the results today. The Nazi war machine is now peaceful Germany once again complete with pretentious techno clubs and scat porn. And the once undefeated Empire of the Sun, birthplace of the deadly samurai, is now the land of Hello Kitty, cosplay, and vending machines with girls' dookie drawers.



9. Rock and Roll



It sprouted up all over our country in different places almost all at once. It was called by some the bastard child of the Blues and Gospel, but if you lived in Texas it was Blues and Country, in Kentucky it was Bluegrass and Gospel. Doesn't matter. As much as we may take it for granted now, this was a turning point for all humanity in that music once again became a more visceral experience. Not since people still lived in tribes had music carried so much feeling and sensual expression. Sure Mozart's music was pretty, Beethoven is great too, and that Big Band stuff that was popular right before Rock was born wasn't bad. But once this new music hit the airwaves, people started to go nuts. The conservative types at the time thought it was everything from a passing fad to literally direct communication from Beelzebub himself, and tried their damndest to have it banned. Fifty years later, it's still the music of free hearted people all over the world, born from a free country by a free people.



10. The Effing Moon




It wasn't a hoax, it wasn't faked, anybody with a good enough telescope and laser can silence the skeptics. One morning in Washington, a possibly still tanked from the night before John F. Kennedy strutted into Congress and proclaimed "We're going to put someone on the moon, and we are going to do it in 10 years." And it was done. After the initial shock of "holy crap there's a guy on the moon" wore off, we discovered that there wasn't actually much to do up there. That is other than making three story shadow puppets, chipping golf balls six miles, and calling the Russian president every night to ask if we were blocking his light. Now at the end of the day the only thing that could conceivably be higher than our flag would be Willie Nelson and Tommy Chong together at an Amsterdam coffee shop.


So there you have it, the Top 10 Most B.M.F. Moments in American History.


Written by a liberal....


Cheers!


Merlyn Trey Hunter

Friday, December 21, 2007

Will Bulls#@t For Food





It's been announced that the comedy duo of Krauthhammer and Kristol the Klown will not have their contracts renewed for Time Magazine. These guys were responsible for some brilliant comedy routines destined to be classics. Classics such as "It's Only Gonna Take Us 6 Months to Win in Iraq", "We'll Be Greeted as Liberators","Iran has a Nuke Pointed Right At Us", and of course, "The CIA Just Wants Bush to Look Bad so it Cooked it's Own Intel, Purposefully Putting the Nation At Risk of Nuclear Annihilation".

As it turned out, there were some readers and listeners who took what these guys had to say seriously. The current impressionable and mentally challenged president was one of those people. And just as PBS had to tone down Ernie and Bert sleeping in the same bed, Time Magazine has seen fit to give these two their walking papers for the sake of the public good. Much like Beavis and Butthead in the 90's, when stupid people started imitating them, they ruined the laughter for all of us.

I'm going to miss these guys, I remember how much they used to crack me up. I remember when they first got their start in that "parody policy" thing they wrote up called the Project for a New American Century where they go on to say that the US needs to become the next global aggressor. Yeah look around on that site, it's comedy gold.

Hopefully Hollywood Squares will pick these guys up so they can eat least make money enough to eat. Is that show even still on? No matter, we'll hear all about them in a VH1 special some day.

Adios, Clowns!

Thursday, December 20, 2007

Asshat of the Day Vol.2

Tucker Carlson is a weasel. I could use that simple sentence for the entire post and get my point across just fine. But as I volunteered to wade out into the sea of equine excrement when I set up this page, I'll go into detail.

This is a fake journalist that must have some kind of dirt on the producers at MSNBC in order to keep his job. I seriously have NO earthly idea how anyone could sit through an entire episode of that Brainy Smurf meets Jiminy Cricket on cocaine voice of his. At least he got rid of the bow tie after Jon Stewart intellectually spanked him on national television. Who could forget these 14 minutes of truth coming to CNN. Crossfire didn't last much longer after this.

Man, poor Jon. He tried, you gotta give him that at least. The same amount of absurdity is still there in the public media discourse. I got this video from Crooks and Liars this morning and I almost got sick. I'll just let you watch and not even set it up.



How does this guy have a job anywhere near the field of journalism. And the fact that we have THAT high a percentage of homeless people who wore a uniform to protect our country IS a big thing and is NOT something to snicker at. He goes further to say that homelessness is all drug addiction and mental illness. Well that's just another pulled out of his ass lie. There are little kids living in our streets Tucker, are they all crackheads and mental patients too? Somebody PLEASE fire this asshole. I heard rumor that Rachel Maddow could be replacing him soon, and I pray that his crying and whining is filmed when that happens.

Until such shining moment he is indeed the Asshat of the Day.

Wednesday, December 19, 2007

The Future....


Weird but true story! I was walking a field by my house when I happened upon this weird blue phone booth thing. The door opened up and some weird British looking dude ran out, hand cupped to his backside, making a bee line for the nearest store. Hey when you gotta go, you gotta go.

I was curious as to what he was doing in a phone booth. In the middle of a field. I mean, if he was in that thing long enough to have to go that bad, it's gotta be something interesting. I got to the thing and it turned out to not be a phone booth, it said "Police Call Box" on the top. Hmmm...why doesn't it say "Policia"(I'm in Costa Rica), why is it blue, why was it here, and what did that guy eat to make him run that damn fast. Poor bastard probably thought this cop box was a jiffy john. Yeah that actually made sense.

So I open this thing up and....well there ain't no way any of you would believe me. Let's just say that whatever cop designed this thing, he used the available space exceptionally. I turned to see the weird English guy jumping up and down yelling at me to "bloody stop", holding his own backside with both hands. I turned to him and yelled back, "Man you better get in that store before you shi'tcher pants!" then proceeded to walk into the blue cop box.

To make it short; got in, checked out the digs, wondered why he never installed a toilet since he had room for a weird 70's style futon, and then decided to check out his music collection. Since English people drive on the wrong side of the road, I had assumed the big pillar in the center was his stereo. So I walked up to the thing to see if I could find any Jethro Tull. Dude was probably going to be back soon anyways and a little pissed, so I figured it best to put something mellow on.

So I hit a bunch of buttons, hoping I wasn't deleting anything. And I saw a counter that said "1/5/2009", and thought to myself "HEY! That's a few days after preznit Asshat gets out of office!" I hit the button under the counter, heard a weird noise like a cross between a car with bad brakes and a cat caught in a wine press, and figured out what this blue thing was for!

NOYCE!!!

I got out and shot some video of what I saw. The air seemed cleaner, children were playing, Phish was announcing it's reunion, and cats were riding dogs like horses....both treasuring the experience. The video I shot of the day after the new President was sworn in is a little grainy. The English dude only had a 70's era camera so bear with me on quality. All the events here are in real time as I saw them.



I gave the cry ass guy too dumb to put a bathroom in his apartment his blue cop box back and apologized. He let me keep the video I took of the post inauguration day events, which I have in turn posted for your viewing pleasure.

No, I don't know who won the Superbowl....

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

WOOAAHH!! Action Alert!!!!


I've just been notified by email that FCC Chairman Kevin Martin and the two republican commissioners on his lap just approved new rules that will allow for a ginormous flood of media consolidation across America. In other words, good bye local and investigative journalism. This is more 1984 crap they are trying to pull to get a stranglehold on every piece of information you receive.

They tried to pull the same stunt in 2003 when they thought no one was looking, but an outcry from people who WERE looking stopped it. This has to end here and now. We have to get back to objective and unbiased journalism before it's too late.

Sign the petition and spread the word. Again, this news is only a few minutes old so there's still time!

Let's Impeach Us a Penguin!!!



Even though it infuriates me to no end that in the last year of a damn good president's term, he and the entire country were subjected to his impeachment at the hands of a bunch of dress sniffing republican weasels desperate to slander him. I remember Ken Starr's hoisting of a dress in the air like he found the Holy Grail.

Fast forward to now. We have the same republican weasels in charge for about six years, completely reversing every good thing that came out of the 90's. Record surplus becomes record deficit. Housing market crashes. A President with the cognitive reasoning of a cocker spaniel sees a memo entitled "Bin Laden Wants To Crash Planes into our Freaking Buildings" and decides it would make a really cool origami project instead of the report it was intended to be. The country is told that gay marriage is a bigger threat than poverty or lack of health care. Basically from 2000 up to 2006, this country was run by the dumbest of the dumb, and for a while people were eating it up.

It got to the point where it began to physically hurt to listen to the news. The poor were vilified, and the rich were given a heaven on earth.

Well the winds of change have once again blown into the halls of liberty. America is waking up from it's testosterone and propaganda induced nightmare to see that they have been deceived. Clinton's indiscretions don't look so bad when you consider the damage done the the country, the constitution, and the free world by these asshats.

There is a Democratic Congressman from my home state that is different from alot of other Democrats in that his spinal column looks to be made of actual bone and not flan. He is driving a campaign to start impeachment proceedings against the turd who has probably been the actual president the whole time.

Please give Congressman Wexler the help he needs to start this process.
Sign his petition to start the return to our country's honor. No more torturers, oil tycoons, war criminals, or latter day czars need to go on with business as usual.

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Soooo Weeeee! Squeal Like A Con For Me!!


I've had to take a couple of days off, but when I saw this at Democratic Underground, I had to share it. I love how these guys come out with something every three or four months that make the neocons and their thralls screech like wounded fruit bats until congress gets involved. Never mind that Ann Coulter can call for the death of a Supreme Court Justice, forget that the Inflatable Rush can call soldiers who protest the war "phoney soldiers", and if Michelle Malkin goes after a 12 year old boy like a political opponent...that's all okay. Why let Congress get involved, it's all good clean right wing fun.

But when someone from the other side decides to bradcast some truth, well then we need Congress to stop what it's doing and condemn it.

Well guys, they're still around and they got something new. Cover your ears, because the banshees are going into overtime on this one.

Monday, December 10, 2007

News with Voltaire


Voltaire (François Marie Arouet, 1694-1778) was a French philosopher credited with influencing many of the founding fathers of our country. The picture above is more or less there for two reasons; one it just looks effing cool and two it nicely sums up the philosophy of the man whose writings I've come to admire. I prefer this image to the frumpy bewiggified 16th century thing he actually did have going on. I wanted to incorporate some quotes of his and relate them to some current events to illustrate both lie and truth in the best way possible. So queue up some Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture and kick back at my first segment of News with Voltaire.

"God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh."

"No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible."

"I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: “O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.” And God granted it."

"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

In closing this segment I would like to leave you with some good old fashioned patriotism in the form of a song performed by a great American. Try to keep your eyes dry everyone....


Friday, December 7, 2007

It Begins.....

Bad monkey! No war for you!! I titled this blog Dissent into Gladness for good reason. Had I started it in 2001, it would have been in a different tone. Now that everything is getting on the table and the public seems to be waking up from it's nightmare, it's damn funny watching this ship of fools sink. Alot of the rats have already jumped ship, and it's getting close to the time when justice will be served and righteousness will prevail.

Mr. Olbermann, I think you can take it from here....




Daaayyyummm!! Can you imagine what horrific fate would have befell our friend here had he made this speech in 2002? Pretty sure we wouldn't be seeing him on TV anymore, which would be a huge crime considering the guy's brilliance.

Thank you Keith. Thank you for saying the things that NEED to be said on national TV. Our nation's return to itself begins here with the hilarity of watching a would be tyrant crash, burn, and try to pretend it was his plan all along.

These are good days to be alive.

Tuesday, December 4, 2007

2+2=4

So for a while was looking like there was going to be a sequel to the 2003 blockbuster, Curious George Lies us into War. The drums were starting to roll, the sabers were rattling, and William Kristol was allowed to speak in public as though he had credibility. All of those things hearkened back to the days of "we don't want the smoking gun.....to be a mushroom cloud" being repeated by every talking head and official in the administration. God, I even remember the theatrics and how they would all say it at the same tone and volume.

And it seemed like everyone fell for it too. And let's face it, kicking over the Taliban regime in Afghanistan wasn't the most satisfactory victory for action film addicted Americans wanting SOMEONE'S ass kicked after 911. It was like eating a vegan meal, it was good for us, but damn if we didn't need some meat. We wanted to see buildings exploding, tanks burning, and to hear the lamentations of the women.

So that almost unanimous feeling, combined with a devious and greedy administration bent on acquiring the Kurdish oil fields, led us to the biggest the biggest screwup in American history. And here we are today, waist deep in an ethnic conflict that has been brewing since the damn viking era. Those of us in dissent who saw this coming were branded every kind of name from anti-American to just plain stupid. I think time and lower blood pressure have vindicated us, but then they try to pull the same damn stunt AGAIN!!

Aaron McGruder, the genius behind The Boondocks comic strip and animated series, summed up the Iraq war perfectly in this jewel of a scene...



Attacking Iran will be this country's final act as a global superpower. The truth of that statement hurts, but truth has a tendency to do that. With all the evidence on the table now with the new NIE report showing they stopped making plans for weapons back in 2003, we wouldn't even have the flimsiest justification for attacking them. If Iraq was our Sudetenland then Iran would be our Poland. We would lose what precious credibility we had left on the international stage, and all the foreign investors that keep our economy afloat would probably withdraw. China, who gets pretty much all of their oil from Iran, would embargo us. All of our industry is there right now by the way, solid gold houses for corporate CEO's don't come cheap you know.

One thing is for certain, if we were to attack Iran and we still could (these assholes are crazy), we would start to be personally affected by it finally. It wouldn't be a distant problem that we could choose to change the channel from. It would be World War 3, and all bets would be off.

My kids and yours deserve better than that.

I just ate a whole pineapple by myself...

Am I going to die?

Asshat O' The Day!

Et tu, Dave?

This is the same guy who actually showed some bespunkified resistance and much needed outrage when he went toe to toe with Scott McClellan over the Valerie Plame mess. Remember how Scott would get all sweaty and flustered when the questions started to dig? It was like watching a live action version Milton from Office Space sans the coke bottle glasses. "I was....told by the....chief....of...hey no comments on ongoing investigations! I beeleeb you have mah stapler!" Good times, good times....

But earlier this week, he was asked by Helen Thomas why American politics are so polarized. Now you and I quickly can surmise that maybe an entire cable news network devoted to propaganda and misinformation might have something to do with it? Or maybe it's conservative leaders playing the "God card" whenever an election comes up so voters feel they have to consider their immortal souls before casting their vote? Oh wait! Maybe it's because "old money" and big business plays way too influential a role in the political landscape?

Nope..according to NBC News Correspondent David Gregory, it's the internet and the blogoshpere that's to blame. That's right folks, it's not any of the rich and powerful forces I mentioned before, it's those pesky common folk on their computers screwing it all up. Go ahead and listen if you don't believe me.



Dave, Dave, Dave....wtf man? You DO realize that if the media in this country actually got their heads out of Paris Hilton's skirt and into what actually matters, there would be alot fewer people like me doing YOUR job. Do you think the 2000 election would have been reported differently on Edward R. Murrow's watch? Think of the outrage the old school journalists would have expressed about a major US city transforming into the Gulf of Mexico and the relief effort being spearheaded by Mr. Horsey Show.

Bloggers (liberal AND conservative) are stepping up to the plate while you over paid paparazzi ignore things like the CIA spook (in charge of making sure we don't get nuked) being outed for political gain. Here's the difference between us; we are people speaking for people, you are just one of the mouthpieces of General Electric.

I accuse you and the majority of your ilk of cowardice and complacency when this country started it's slide into fascism by cheering on an illegal "preemptive" war in 2003. You people had access to the truth, but you stuck your heads in the sand and ignored it out of fear. Remember the Dixie Chicks? Now when regular people step up to the plate and BECOME the media that you simply aren't, you accuse us of being the problem? Well I guess Britney not wearing underwear one day is more important....

Screw you David Gregory, you are my first "Asshat of the Day"

Sunday, December 2, 2007

From '67 to '07, Truth from Across Time

People are fond of saying "those who refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat it", and that's a very true statement. I think there have been very few cases where it has happened to a nation over such a short span of time such as here though. Just like in Vietnam, a war was started on the pretense of a national security threat and coming to the aid of those in need. And just like then, it was all just a big hoax to line the pockets of merchants and defense contractors.

It's even the same effing cast of characters right down to Rumsfeld being there at the exact moment he could do the most harm. Dick Cheney made a return to bonehead strategic thinking on a global scale after his hiatus too. Tricky Dick Nixon's war cabinet helped organize this war in Iraq and it seems they face the exact same repercussions for screwing it up like last time..... retirement in riches.

Thankfully other things remained the same too though. At first the people who thought this war was a dumb idea were branded liberals, traitors, and associated with Barbara Streisand. But as the body count rises, and the exit door drifts further down the hallway, people are starting to see what this mess is all about. And we have these words from another man from that time who actually deserves to be with us still, but isn't. This is 23 minutes of your life that you really need to invest for the sake of knowing the bigger picture.

Ebenezer Baptist Church April 30, 1967

This is one of the most beautiful sermons the good Reverend ever gave. As you listen, you may get chills as this speech could very well have been made last week about this war.




When I think of all the bigoted flotsam and jetsam coming from current religious leaders like Pat Robertson who actually called for the death of a world leader on national TV, I see why so many are drawn to agnosticism. But here was a man who actually thought Christianity was supposed to be based on the teachings of the gentle Nazarene, and not some Norse god of war. Where IS the Religious Left nowadays? How did mainstream American Christianity slip so far to the right of the political center? Listen to this MLK speech and then one from Pat Robertson and you will swear we are working with religions as far apart as Buddhism and Orthodox Aztec Church of Heart Removal.

Friday, November 30, 2007

A Tale of Two Georgies (Part 1)

Boston December 17, 1773

Ye Olde Uncle Foch Snooze’s Tavern and Whiskerarium

It’s Friday night and the place is packed full of men with too little deodorant and women with too much underwear. Our country is still in its larval stage at this point, but some themes that have stuck with us are readily apparent. Just common folks unwinding after a vicious pre-Revolutionary work week. The atmosphere is tense because of “George”, and his name is brought up quite a bit in both the “liberal” and “conservative” cliques.

Standing on a wooden table giving a speech we have powdery wig wearing Walter Walterson, a conservative in the acceptable definition for that era. Back then they had a different name, they were called Tories. Walter is ticked off what with all of the scruffy looking ne’er do wells rocking the boat by defying HIS beloved George. Intellectual snobs who thought themselves wiser than the king, they were. These riff raff were threatening the status quo that made the Colonies great and British.

“A man should be proud to have soldiers of the crown garrisoned in his house by order of his liege!” Walter announced as he hefted his tin flagon in the direction of a new bailey that was hastily constructed after the last riot. “It shows a special kind of regard for his subjects when his majesty bestows this honor, a special trust! We face the most deadly enemies in the history of our empire whatever inconveniences we must endure for our families’ safety should NOT concern us. Unless you have something to hide that is…..”

Uncle Foch Snooze’s was a Torie tavern after all, so Walt’s spontaneous declaration of crown loyalty and regurgitated propaganda was well met with a room full of “aye”s and similarly raised flagons. “We are the only true citizens of this land! And God has given our kingdom these colonies as a testament to the greatness of the British Empire!! Long live the king!”

Seamus Hannedy and William O’Reely, Walter’s Irish stable boy and manservant (respectively) jumped to their feet in support of their master’s words. Seamus, being the boldest but the dumbest of the two was first to add to the growing pep rally. “Here, here master! Oye gets tahrned in a bed whey whenever me hart thinksa nuttin boot tha king b’gosh I tell ye!” Awkward general silence eventually oozed into a state of equally awkward and confused sounds of accord as the crowd GUESSED he meant something ….well something good. The thing about Hannedy was that even HE didn’t know what was coming out of his mouth half the time. Top notch stable boy though…

The harbor was still a dark amber color from the escapades the night before. The local ruffians backed by their “Sons of Liberty” puppet masters had destroyed a precious cargo of British tea by dumping it overboard from the ships to the water below. The proud vessels Dartmouth and the newly arrived Beaver and Eleanour were violated and the livelihoods of Boston’s tea merchants were shamelessly inconvenienced. Those ships are the king's property, after all. The proud Dartmouth, graceful Eleanour, and yes even the king's precious Beaver were violated all night long by shabby men.

(snicker)

At first, everyone had said local Indians were responsible. One of them even had “I be an injun bloke” written in red paint on the back of his jacket to avoid any potential confusion. Clever ruse….these people were good. However the drunken boasts the next morning pointed to liberal scum, Alexander Hamilton, as the ring leader of these beastly men.

And that was the source of all the fuming and grumbling in the smoky recesses of Uncle Foch Snooze’s that cold Friday night. Resentment was growing, and it was beginning to fester in drinking establishments such as these. These upstart colonists who claim no loyalty to the great George are nothing more than traitors, scallywags, and “readers” in the hearts and minds of this establishment.

These Sons of Liberty were starting to spread their message of defiance throughout His Majesty’s colonies. And last night’s ruckus will serve as a recruiting tool for years to come unless they find a way to stem this tide of liberalism. The notion of a person being in charge of his own destiny and not subject to the king’s rule was laughable at best. If all men are created equal, then why are some men born king? Let their so called “free minds” chew on that one for a while!

Who did these barbarians think they were? After all, even after dumping all of that luxurious tea into the harbor, the soldiers and constables had to stop people from running into the dark Earl Grey surf with enormous crumpets clutched to their chests like boogie boards*. One unfortunate woman who succeeded in the stunt was heard to slur, “quite lovely” before succumbing to hypothermia and adding more chaos to the harbor’s surreal new biochemical makeup. So they were still English at heart after all and the tea was of impeccable quality. What a waste.

Walter continued his tirade. “It’s all these foreign influences, Catholics, Masons, and intellectuals that have taken us here! If we could just go back to being a white, English, Protestant, and well behaved little colony I’m certain all of this chaos will pass! We have mixed ourselves too closely with too many different kinds of people and we have become perilously close to….diversity!”

The simultaneous gasp of the entire tavern conveyed the brevity of his last statement. And Walter used the ensuing silent pause to gaze upon everyone assembled with a look that meant business, brow furrowed, nostrils flared, and talcum powder cascading like unholy snowflakes from his fake hair. Anger and irritation in the crowd were starting to give way to genuine dread and fear. Fear of being forced into accepting undesirable elements of humanity as “different” instead of the more comfortable “less than”. What next? A Catholic governor? Poor people owning land?

The assembled crowd was a cross section of the more wealthy and influential loyalists in the upper colonies. Walter had his riders send invitations to the gathering this morning after reading about the tea incident in the newspaper. There was no masking the paper’s liberal bias anymore as the headline simply read verbatim: “HA HA HA HA!” There were also several articles praising the qualities of this new black tar drink called “coffee”. Yeah, like that would ever take the place of a good cup of tea…..it’ll never catch on here.

“You’ve made your point, young Walterson!” wafted the wizened voice of Sir Cockton “Cock” Shaney. Sir Shaney always made it a point to be the voice of reason at these gatherings. No one was certain what exactly earned him his knighthood, but rumor had it that George and he were student and teacher once upon a time. There was a darkness to him that couldn’t be readily explained. All babies within twenty paces of him just start shrieking inconsolably. Whatever it was, Sir Shaney had a way of making even the hardest British redcoat scamper aside in fear whenever they crossed his path.

Shaney continued “Until this body accepts my last written proposal and acts on it, we shall all be listening to the same speech over and over again, just with different words. I painstakingly pointed out every detail required to make it come to fruition, I even provided visual aids to…”

“Cock!” Walter interrupted.

“Yes?”

“Ah yes, you are referring to the written proposal you submitted by carving ‘just torture the bastards to death’ into your chair and using it to beat your chambermaid into a coma last Christmas party? The council has already deliberated, has made its decision, and stands by it. There were children in the same room for God’s sake, man! We respectfully ask that you lay that plan to rest, Sir, however appealing and intricate as it may seem to you.”

“Fags…..”

Karlton Rovington, the rotund fertilizer tycoon, used the uncomfortable silence to give his input. “The liberal elements in this country have us at a disadvantage on the following fronts: education, press bias, and these weird concepts called ‘facts’. Facts are these strange pieces of information that are supposedly not subject to the crown’s scrutiny or alteration. Here is one example of a supposed ‘fact’, if you jump in front of a running horse you will be hurt. Well what if you’re the king? Wouldn’t the horse either stop or be instantly transported to Hades for its insolence?”

“Oooh ya bet’cher arse this guy’s smart!!!” O’Reely piped in from the back. “Quiet taig!” barked Walter in response. He was also transfixed by the hardcore science his colleague was laying down. “Go on, Rovington, you have our attention.”

The tubby man’s sweat glistened like anointing oil as he continued. “Gladly! If we can defeat their facts, we have them dead to rights. And I am here to tell you that facts are easily killed with some simple formulas. Reason is always overpowered by emotion if that emotion can be tweaked far enough. For example let’s say we have one of these bleeding heart Sons of Liberty types giving another one of their soapbox speeches about how all ‘oppressed and subjugated’ we are. One of us can be there to yell ‘hey I noticed we haven’t been invaded by the Turks yet! I guess it’s a good thing our king keeps you safe enough to be able to make that speech huh?!? Let’s face it, gentlemen, no one wants the Turks invading!”

“The Turks…….my GOD, is that a possibility?!” This came from Willie Gibbsin whose lacquered beechwood wig moved as one unit when he raised his eyebrows at the thought of an imminent Turkish invasion. The same wooden wig probably saved him several nasty cuts after he then shrieked in a pitch that should have been way to high for a man and executed a flawless (but horizontal) triple corkscrew dive through the glass window next to him.

“No, no, no you idiots!! It’s NOT a possibility”, Rovington was trying to calm the quickly panicking room by speaking very loudly and slowly. “It couldn’t happen in a million years, and that’s my point! The common people don’t know that, in fact they know very little about the world beyond their farms and churches. We can say pretty much whatever we want to say, and if we say it with enough conviction, the people will believe the bloody sky is green!"

“But Rovington, you said yourself that we are at the disadvantage when it comes to education.” Walter chimed in, “the leaders of this rabble will know deceit when it’s this obvious, and its part of their agenda to make everyone just as educated as they are.”

“Which is why we must work to kill their ‘facts’ as efficiently as we can. We have to approach the common people as though we were ‘one of them’ and….”

“Eeeeewwwww! Seriously?” Screeched the Widow Coultain

“…and show them that being a good British subject is an obedient one by projecting a sense of superiority over these new ‘freedom huggers’. If they believe we are "just plain salts" like them, we can present our "view" as some kind of backwoods wisdom. We will attack their leaders personally by spreading enough misinformation to keep BOTH sides wondering who is telling the truth. We also need to start our own press works that churns out nothing but praise to the king and our point of view whilst ridiculing all others.”

“We can name it ‘FLOWERS’!!!” Someone in back screamed as though the word “eureka” should have preceded the sentence.

“We can name it after this tavern for all I care, the point is we need a method of steering the hearts and minds of this country back to what’s important: King, country, and working endless hours for us in complete servitude. And by the time we are done with them, we’ll have them thinking God just wants it that way!”

With that the entire tavern erupted into thunderous applause. Hope for a return to the “simpler times” seemed real and attainable. Plans were made and schemes were cooked to thwart this new enemy to the crown. This disgusting notion of “freedom” was about to become just another passing fad like “democracy” in ancient Greece or roller disco in twelfth century Venice*.

A consensus was taken and the first target they were going to focus on was Alexander Hamilton himself. Best to start the effort locally, and besides, it was time he paid for all that tea that was snatched from the king’s Beaver!

Monday, November 26, 2007


Ask Rockridge: Responding to Conservative Name-Calling

Created by george_at_rockridge (Rockridge Institute staff member) on Sunday, November 11, 2007 04:00 PM

How can we respond to conservative attacks on our patriotism?

We were recently asked how to respond when confronted with the attack, "Aw you liberals just hate America."

This is name-calling with a destructive (and false) frame. There are times when it is necessary to have a retort, not for its own sake, but to allow you to shift the frame and say a lot more on any one of many topics. The replacement frame should express progressive views while revealing key truths hidden by the original frame. Here is one strategy:

"Aw you liberals just hate America."

No. We love democracy and we want to return it to America.
You want a presidential dictator.
We love liberty and we want to return it to America.
You want to tap our phones.
We love equality and we want to return it to America.
You think some people are better than others.
We love honesty and we want to return it to America.
You love lobbyists and corruption.
We love fairness and we want to return it to America.
You want to oppress the powerless.
We love openness and we want to return it to America.
You love secrecy and hiding the facts.
We love nature's glory and we want to return it to America.
You love the profit that comes from destroying nature.
We love community and we want to return it to America.
You want everyone to fend for himself.
We love public education and we want to return it to America.
You want to destroy public education.
We love civilian control of the military and we want to return it to America.
You want to militarize America.
And on and on...

George Lakoff
The Rockridge Institute


Friday, November 23, 2007

Ann Coulter's Newest Scandal A Crushing Secret Revealed!!!

The birds were just starting to come back to the skies. These same skies were beginning to shed the dull green tint that had haunted it since the morning of 10/4/07 when columnist Ann Coulter last opened her mouth on national television to other than a fixed audience.

Her handlers had forgotten to tell her that she wasn't in the cold dark embrace of the Faux News Channel's newsroom, her natural habitat. Maybe they had just had enough.... Maybe she proved especially stubborn that morning when they prodded her into her transport crate and they were craving sweet working man's revenge. Harpy Handling is an old world craft after all, and like the stone masons I'm sure the odd secret society has sprung up through the course of their history that could easily be offended by her. Maybe her endorsement of Rumsfeld's new project "Baby Flakes" cereal, but we'll know for sure.

So she was released into the CNBC studio wearing her signature black and red Santa-skin miniskirt (yeah that's why you didn't get your Wii last year) and jewelry fashioned from the tears of his elves forced to watch the slaughter. The following train wreck of an exchange then transpired....




What gets me the most probably is the fact that she was asked a very good and potentially telling question about why it is she is such a B. Indeed what WOULD this country look like if the right wing lords of batshit finally "won"? We had a chance here to see what it was that these assclowns were so passionate about that supposedly excuses their actions. The "Ends Justifying the Means" is a debate I think everyone has had with themselves. Salesman, Lawyers, and pundits more so. And because of that, maybe we had a chance to see some humanity come from these people.

The question totally stumped her....

The best response she could come up with was the 2004 Repugnican National Convention. And depending on what side of the issues you were, that environment either looked like this:



Or This:



I don't know about you, but NEITHER of those Dante rings looks nice to me. So in an effort to quickly mask the fact that hell on earth is actually the neocons' true goal, she quickly lifted her skirt and flashed America some good old down home right wing intolerance. Good Save!!

But the collateral damage still exists and until today, she's been a pariah even in the Faux land of make believe news. But here in this blog, you have an exclusive peek into the double life of Ann Coulter. You see in addition to playing the journalistic equivalent of Cruella Deville, she has had a very successful music career throughout the 80's and various county fairs and swap meets throughout this great country.

You might remember this little ditty, and I close this entry with Ann singing one of our favorite junior high anthems from them wacky 80's. And before you ask, yes I DO realize that this makes her gender even MORE of a mystery. Good night and Good Luck....

Nothing good can come of this....

So in the seventh year of the occupation by the clown prince of the Texas oil baron's wannabe mafia this blog commences. ....

Those of you who have come over from my stumbleupon site, welcome! I haven't posted there in a while due to the combined obstacles of my Costa Rican ISP and an unusually tenacious cyber stalker. But I have found that I can no longer keep my words in and my conscience is getting stretch marks from the effort. But I have a fresh batch of rants and observations that I just slapped on the grill for your continued intellectual amusement.

For those of you just meeting me in this format: Welcome! My name is Merlyn Hunter and I am an expatriate American living and working in Costa Rica. I have found in my year here that the best way to be an American right now in these sad times is to not live in America. I love my country, but I am "seeing other people" right now. I have been a freelance writer for some time right now and have made a few appearances in a few columns under a few pen names. Though my politics tend to lean a little to the left a majority of the time, I also have a few conservative views as well. And I am informed enough to know the difference between a respectable "true conservative", a loathsome neocon, and the neocon thralls who wrongfully believe themselves to be the former.

So with that in mind, let fly the mud! And be warned trolls and flamers....my keyboard has no stun setting.