Happy Halloween!

I wish I had something more cogent to say on the subject. I like Halloween. Any holiday that gives kids a chance to run amok is okay by me. I haven't done much of anything for it since I got to old to trick-or-treat, but still: BOO!

I don't really have anything to say about this one...

...I just wanted to point it out because it appears that Tinsley was drunk when he wrote it. Seriously--what? What?

Happy Birthday Kate

Post redacted due to being REALLY FUCKING EMBARRASSING in retrospect.

Google-bombin'

It's the least I can do. Literally. If you have a blog, feel free to join in.

--AZ-Sen: Jon Kyl

--AZ-01: Rick Renzi

--AZ-05: J.D. Hayworth

--CA-04: John Doolittle

--CA-11: Richard Pombo

--CA-50: Brian Bilbray

--CO-04: Marilyn Musgrave

--CO-05: Doug Lamborn

--CO-07: Rick O'Donnell

--CT-04: Christopher Shays

--FL-13: Vernon Buchanan

--FL-16: Joe Negron

--FL-22: Clay Shaw

--ID-01: Bill Sali

--IL-06: Peter Roskam

--IL-10: Mark Kirk

--IL-14: Dennis Hastert

--IN-02: Chris Chocola

--IN-08: John Hostettler

--IA-01: Mike Whalen

--KS-02: Jim Ryun

--KY-03: Anne Northup

--KY-04: Geoff Davis

--MD-Sen: Michael Steele

--MN-01: Gil Gutknecht

--MN-06: Michele Bachmann

--MO-Sen: Jim Talent

--MT-Sen: Conrad Burns

--NV-03: Jon Porter

--NH-02: Charlie Bass

--NJ-07: Mike Ferguson

--NM-01: Heather Wilson

--NY-03: Peter King

--NY-20: John Sweeney

--NY-26: Tom Reynolds

--NY-29: Randy Kuhl

--NC-08: Robin Hayes

--NC-11: Charles Taylor

--OH-01: Steve Chabot

--OH-02: Jean Schmidt

--OH-15: Deborah Pryce

--OH-18: Joy Padgett

--PA-04: Melissa Hart

--PA-07: Curt Weldon

--PA-08: Mike Fitzpatrick

--PA-10: Don Sherwood

--RI-Sen: Lincoln Chafee

--TN-Sen: Bob Corker

--VA-Sen: George Allen

--VA-10: Frank Wolf

--WA-Sen: Mike McGavick

--WA-08: Dave Reichert

New Jersey doesn't completely suck

Dobson, however, is as much of a horrible little creep as ever. The man's seventy years old now. God, I hope he clings on to life long enough to see gay marriage legalized on a national level.

It's an outrage!

And you know what's even worse? BIG MEDIA refuses to do a story on inchoatia.blogspot.com, the hot new blogging sensation that's sweeping the nation! It's providing an exciting alternative for people who are tired of blogs that are "popular" and "updated regularly" and "feature cogent, thoughtful analysis." It burns my britches, it does!

Anyway, let us now examine the wildfire-esque group that BIG MEDIA refuses to cover because they're all big fat hypocrites.

The page design could charitably be described as spartan. I know, I know--but I am not a new conservative college group that's spreading like wildfire across the country, am I? ...or am I? I'll let you be the judge of that.

Anyway, we can get a good idea of the oceanic scope of the group from the blurb and picture on the front page. "More than 30 young women gathered on Friday, July 14th on Capitol Hill for the first annual NeW National Conference, entitled "A NeW Generation of Women," we are told. Shit, dude--more than thirty? And they're actually selling themselves short, because if you do a headcount of the picture they've provided, you will find that there are actually thirty-one of them. "More than thirty" is an understatement!

Still, I guess I'm willing to assume--although I'm probably conceding way too much here--that only one percent of the membership could make it to the conference, putting their overall membership at thirty-one hundred. I suppose that qualifies for some value of "wildfire."

You can also see that they're grasping pretty hard for attention with their press listings, inasmuch as these include individual Mallard Fillmore cartoons. And they even have today's, meaning that they likely have volunteers obsessively scouring the internet searching for mentions. I think I deserve some of that sugar--what possible better press could they get than being mentioned in the hot new blogging sensation that's sweeping the nation? I am much more trustigious than Tinsley is. Jeez.

On the "about NEW" page we read:

"NeW was started as a book club. Members meet biweekly to discuss one book each semester. Only a semester after NeW was founded at UVa, some students at the College of William and Mary heard about NeW and started their own NeW chapter."

Once again: shit, dude! A whole book each semester? And these aren't just regular books: they're deeply, complex, sophisticated right-wing polemics. No wonder you're having trouble finding members--no one can keep up with your insane, breakneck pace. Better tone it down a bit, ladies. Check yourselves before you wreck yourselves.

"NeW chapters engage in other activities in addition to meeting as a book club. NeW chapters have hosted speakers and debates to counter The Vagina Monologues. NeW chapters have held movie nights, dinners and parties."

"Counter the vagina." I feel as though I ought to be making some crude joke involving the phrase "cock blocking" here, but I am far beyond such juvenile hijinx. As you know. Seriously, why the obsession with The Vagina Monologues? It was published six years ago (at least--I'm having trouble finding an exact date), for gods' sake. Surely other things have happened since then that you could be outraged about? It's bizarre that it gets its own category, is what I'm really trying to get at. As if it were a cause all by itself. It's as if I were chairing a meeting about left-wing causes, and I opened by saying, "okay, tonight we're going to discuss anti-war efforts, environmental initiatives, and this one time I saw this truck with bumper stickers that totally pissed me off." Which of these does not belong?

Is it just that the word vagina bothers you? Vagina vagina vagina! It's really not a big deal, and you're deeply neurotic for thinking otherwise. Readers with disturbingly long memories may recall that I complained about the play many moons ago on my old page in a naive kind of way, and I imagine if I saw it again I'd still find it problematic on some levels--but jeez. I don't think about it on a daily basis. I am QUITE certain that you think about if far more than any of its fans. Probably more than Eve Ensler herself.

Anyway, that's all for me, 'cause there ain't a whole lot more to say about the enlightened women's rather anemic website. I hope if anyone from BIG MEDIA sees this entry, they will immediately begin preparing a headline story on this website. Otherwise, they are totally TEH BIAS.

Peanut Butter

Be it resolved that peanut butter with added sugar is NOT REAL PEANUT BUTTER. Sure, it's okay in candy and baked goods, but if we're just talking about regular ol' jars of the stuff, leave out the sugar, k?

So you can get regular Smucker's peanut butter, which is referred to on the jar as "natural." Or you can get the "Organic" variety. And you would think that this would be a negligible difference. Oh, I can picture you explaining, there's no reason to go for the organic! It costs more, and apart from some abstract sense of smugness I might feel for going organic, there's no difference! I'm a loser who doesn't even like pineapple!

But, as usual, you would be wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. Because the real difference between the two--and I have no idea why this should be the case, but it is--is that the non-organic kind has WAY more salt in it. How much more? I don't have a jar of the non-organic here to judge, but the organic claims to have two percent of your recommended daily value, whereas the "natural" claims to have five percent. So, since the organic has fifty mg, the "natural" would presumably have 125. And I've gotta tell ya, after getting used to the organic kind, the other is barely edible--it's just hideously salty. Blech. Whereas, goddamn, the organic is practically like eating candy in itself. So for discerning eaters, the choice is clear.

Goddamn was this ever a boring post.

This is not a person. It is clearly a talking-points robot.

I was looking at this piece featuring people's opinions on the war, and this one stood out:

I would like to see our boys come home sooner rather than later. However, I am for staying the course and finishing the job we started over there. It is but just one front in the war on terror. If we don't meet them head on and kill them in their back yard they will be coming over here to kill us in our back yards. We need to be proactive in this fight! Our fighting men and women are doing a great job except for a few bad apples. We may need to change some of our strategy but we need to keep the pressure on the fanatic terrorists, bring freedom and security to the people of Iraq!
Warren E., Belen, New Mexico

You, Mr. Belan, are a self-parody. How fucking frightening is it that there be people who have absorbed Republican talking points to such a degree?

I CALLED IT.

I. totally. fucking. called it. Not that it was a particularly amazing feat of prestidigitation. Still: someone called it. Who called it? I called it.

I've gotta say, Tinsley's grotesque caricature of Clinton might be more effective if he were at all capable of drawing famous people as anything other than grotesque caricatures.

New element created!

Neato. I really like this bit, at the end:

The Livermore-Dubna team says they are now looking to discover element 120

Oh yeah? Well I'm looking to discover element infinity plus one. That'll show you stuck-up jerks.

WHY DOES THIS CASSOWARY LOOK SAD?

It might be because he is reflecting that, even though he is the world's third-largest bird, he gets little of the respect that he deserves. Even his handsome crest is not enough to elevate him in people's eyes. He might be thinking cruel things about ostriches and emus, and wishing they would go extinct so he could be number one. Then, he feels guilty about wishing for such things. And he feels even less significant as a bird. It's a downward spiral of shame.

I hope that this cassowary feels better at some point in the future, but I think that for this to happen, he is going to have to seriously rethink his assumptions and priorities. Does he have the strength for that level of self-reflection? It remains to be seen. We can but hope.

ps. While I was searching for pictures of cassowaries, I came upon this wholly delightful bit of nonsense)

What the hell are you babbling about now?

Look, honey, they're having a two-for-one sale!

Ineffective PR: the other day I witnessed a plane cruising along towing a big ol' banner. "10 Week Abortion," it said. Below this was an eight hundred number; beside it some sort of blurry picture that I couldn't see well because it was far away and I wasn't wearing my glasses. The picture, presumably, was of a fetus, and the purpose of the banner, presumably, was to agitate against abortion, but my immediate, confused thought upon seeing the message plus the phone number was that it was meant as an advertisement for the procedure in question. "From now 'til Friday, big savings at Bob's Abortion Shack!" Or maybe that was the intended purpose. I don't know.

I mock. But I'm not totally unsympathetic...strike that: I am totally unsympathetic to assholes who try to make their point by waving around pictures of feti. Or to the massive hypocricy of declaring oneself "pro-life" while supporting republicans.

But leaving aside the fact that stridently anti-abortion types tend to be kind of dickish--pretending these people don't exist--I don't think it's a totally clear-cut issue. I consider myself a pro-choice absolutist. No ifs, ands, or buts. "But partial-birth abortion, blah blah blah." No. Fuck off. That's not an honest point to raise. Late-term abortions are very rare, and mostly for health reasons, as you well know. The entire point of that argument is to get you to concede that some abortion should be banned. Once they've got you to concede that, you've lost the moral high ground. It's the same as the "ticking time bomb" pro-torture argument. If you admit that torture would be okay in some paranoid wing-nut's insane, hypothetical fever-dream, you'll just start to admit more and more. It is nicely crystalized in the old sexist yet pithy joke: "Will you sleep with me for a million dollars?" "Sure." "How about ten dollars?" "What kind of a girl do you think I am?" "We've already established that; now we're just working out the details." Sorry: I refuse to be that kind of girl.

So. But I don't think it's an issue that you can drain of its emotional charge, and I have a serious problem with people who think that it's a totally neutral procedure, like an apendectomy, and that the only reason anybody who has one feels guilty or depressed is because of the relentless screeching of anti-abortion types. Certainly, these assholes exacerbate the stiuation, but I don't think they are the only factor. I'm not saying that I think anyone has an obligation to feel guilty, or anything nutty like that--the fewer who do, the better. But I also think that the claim that it's a totally invalid thing to experience is totally specious, and that all you're going to do is confuse and further injure people who are in an emotionally fragile state anyway. To me, it evinces a remarkable lack of empathy.

A new word enters the lexicon

Changing subjects so fast we all die of whiplash

It's actually quite bizarre that he just abandonded the dubious "OMG TEH LIBRUL'S DAUGHTER IS TEH CONSERVATIVE!!!!111" premise midstream. Heart wasn't in it, I suppose. Oh Bruce, what's happened to you? In the old days, you would have stretched that out for WEEKS.

(also, a less hacktacular cartoonist might have tried to get some character-based humor out of the situation. But I guess that would only apply to a cartoonist who tries to get humor out of things.)

Why can't Bil Keane himself do it like this?

Seriously, this is awesome.

Funferal!

Random NINJA SCHOOL WILL HELP YOU

You know what I like? When people on the itunes network have their libraries limited to five users a day or, better yet, password-protected. Oooh, yeah, better be careful, 'cause I'm sure there's sooooo much demand for your awesome collection of four or five hundred songs INVARIABLY involving Blink 182, Coldplay, John Mayer, and Panic! at the Disco. Seriously, every single person has the EXACT SAME COLLECTION. Also, an inflated sense of self-worth. Anyway.

01. Cowboy Bebop, "Ask DNA"
From the (somewhat overrated) movie. But this is pleasingly funky. 8/10

02. Elvis Costello, "You Belong to Me"
Well, it's not my favorite from This Year's Model, but that's okay. I like the organ in the background. 7/10

03. Pulp, "The Night that Minnie Timperley Died"
Classic Pulp. It was great to hear that Jarvis was still up to things like this after the murkiness of This Is Hardcore. 9/10

04. They Might Be Giants, "For Science"
A brief slip of a song, but highly entertaining. Let's get those missiles ready to DESTROY THE UNIVERSE! 8/10

05. Echo and the Bunnymen, "No Dark Things"
One of the best things from Heaven Up Here. But still not great. Sounds kind of like a poor man's Joy Division. 6/10

06. Tom Waits, "King Kong"
A cover of a song by this Daniel Johnston fellow, who appears to be, at any rate, mildly mentally retarded. Or twelve. But I like it quite a bit. It features Waits' human beatboxing in the background. Good times. 7/10

07. Oasis, "Cigarettes and Alcohol"
Imagina-shee-un! Sun-shee-ine! I wouldn't say this is the best thing on Definitely Maybe, but still--their sorry latter-day career makes ALL their early stuff look like genius. 8/10

08. Emerson, Lake, & Palmer, "Jerusalem"
It's kinda difficult not to giggle a bit at this after that one Monty Python episode ("Yes, you know, it's a man's life in England's mountains green")--but I like it anyway. 7/10

09. Depeche Mode, "Master and Servant"
Ooh, aren't we transgressive. How can anyone possibly take the "it's a lot (it's a lot) it's a lot (it's a lot) it's a lot (it's a lot) it's a lot like life" refrain seriously? It certainly has some inintentional humor value, however. 4/10

10. Mary Gauthier, "Evangeline"
A painful love song to a stripper. I think it would be a good one for crying into your beer to, if you were in such a mood. 9/10

Update: JESUS CHRIST, how many typos did I make in this damn post? Hopefully, they're all fixed. But I wouldn't bet on it.

Amusement turns to disgust

Jesus Fucking Christ, you people. The party of MORAL VALUES can't even take an unequivocal stance against CHILD MOLESTATION now? Well golly gee whillikers. Whodathunkit. In a way, it's sort of morbidly amusing to watch them thrash around, but in another, more important way, it just makes me want to puke. Ain't no valley low enough, clearly.

Damn communist gamers

So at some point, some random Russian gamefaqs-type website stole my old and creaky faq for Dangerous Dave. I am vaguely annoyed, yet also flattered. I would half-jokingly complain to someone, but I don't speak furrin. But I am gratified to see that my faq apparently got seventy-one percent of...something. That oughta be good fodder for the ol' cv. I think seventy-one is probably about what it deserves. It has good information; it'll get you through the game in style. Unfortunately, it is undeniably overly cutesy in parts. Also, I never bothered updating it with the important information on how to recognize the illusion platforms. This post has no point. Here's a random image I made here:



Update: yeah, fucked if I know why it won't display. Click on the thin little box and you can bring it up.

I WARNED you people!

Dance in the ruins

I'm seriously enjoying watching this Mark Foley thing, I have to say. It would've been kinda nice if the gop could be beaten based on their raging incompetence, but hey, I'll take whatever I can get. And WOW, is this the most skin-crawling thing you've ever read, or what?

What I'm really looking forward to is the ever-sage Mallard Fillmore response. Honestly, I'm not convinced that even Bruce would be dumb enough to touch this. But then, nobody ever went broke underestimating his intelligence. If he does, I'll bet he compares it to Clinton: Why wasn't he forced to resign from office? Huh? Huh? Hypocrites! Never mind that you'd have to be a brain-damaged toddler to equate the two of them--that's kind of Bruce's demographic right there.

And while we're on the subject, I absolutely have to point this one out:



Just HOW perfect is it that Tinsley's CLINTON CLINTON OH GOD CLINTON award is shaped like a penis? Completely perfect, is how perfect. He really lacks even the most rudimentary self-awareness, doesn't he?