My Long Weekend

I guess I have a couple things I want to talk about. This is sort of a mop-up deal. Not too much going on lately. First of all, I want to point out that having a general as the head of the CIA is good. It's only about infinitely better than him being in charge of the NSA. Hell, the CIA is all about everywhere but here. Spy away, General Hayden. I think this is one of those traps conservatives set for liberals. It's sort of like peeing on the Koran/Q'uran at Gitmo. As a fairly enlightened cat, yeah, my immediate reaction is that that is wrong. But then I think to myself, "Would I care if they were peeing on Bibles/Torahs?" The answer is of course, nary one iota.

I guess it might be sort of bad if the guy peeing was a good Christian, but as a third party observer, I can't care.

Of course, should we suspend the way we run our country to keep these dweebs there? Of course not. You know what, show me one... wait, I mean let Rove selectively declassify one good thing that has come out of Gitmo. I mean it's not like you are blowing anybody's cover. There are no double agents working this one. These are people that have been missing from their terrorist cells for years. I think that even Richard Reid would have figured out that his chum, missing all these years, might be compromised. So declassify that, pricks.

Otherwise you're all assholes, and what the hell, right? But that I almost forgot this... Well I just want to say that pissing all over my rights directly to make me forget that you sacrificed the Constitution on some hidden altar of pagan justice and heathen security, well good show, cockasses. Camoflaging your subterfuge. Mmmmmmm.

Wow, I guess I had a little bit to talk about afterall. Hell, this is serious enough I guess the other thing I wanted to talk about (Mission Impossible:III), will have to be another post...

But back to what apparently was a whole postworthy topic, or at least a little thing that inspired yet another rambly rant. Getting General Hayden out of the NSA is a good thing. Liberals rejoice. And as Americans we should all rejoice, because Porter Goss, holy shit. Here's who would have been better than Porter Goss. Imagine Willow, before the lesbian empowerment, hell, before college even. I'm not making an Alyson Hannigan joke, I swear. I just think that Willow would have been a better Director of the CIA. Alyson Hannigan not in the Willow character would smoke Goss even more thoroughly.

And only because it's a serious quick hit, how can the most recent MI:III commercials say that the critics "can't stop talking" about that shitty movie? Seriously, they can't? Did they re-review it? "Holy mackerel, MI:III is STILL good. It has aged well these last couple weeks...Fuck it, I'm adding a star!"

Oh, I am selling a short story, 100% of the rights, on ebay. That's how I spent my Sunday. Man, that was seriously unfun, but it's a good story. If you work for Disney or whoever, believe it or not, it should be an awesome children's movie. So feel free to peruse. Honestly, "Holy mackerel, 'The Rapscallion' is still good. Fuck it, I'm adding a star." I'll link to the auction when it goes live. Hell, it will at least end up prolly the most read thing I've written.

EFF vs. AT&T/Room 641A

I generally wobble between pissed and funny. Well I hope I'm funny. But I don't want to be funny. I absolutely want to ride a giant. I want to thank WIRED Magazine, and as always, the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Juevos mas grande. Everybody on the internet (myself included) have at least partially ranted about the NSA program to log every phonecall we make in America, not from terrorist to terrorist, but from you to your mom. Fine, you say. You are admittedly pretty dodgy. But what about your mom to her mom, calling to discuss an important apple pie recipe revision? Well that's a foul.

So last week AT&T and Los Federales, in the middle of the night, had the evidence of this program squelched in order to obliterate a legitimate lawsuit. The response came from WIRED. Last night, around 2AM, they published all the documents AT&T and the NSA wanted locked away. HERE IS THE LINK. Don't just click on it. Honestly, it's boring, boring stuff. Combining legalese with techno-babble. It's a tough read. But wooooweeeee, look at all the corporate logos. It's nothing short of a NASCAR fender, except this is America's formerly best, brightest and smartest using their churchkey to punch crude triangle holes in my 64oz. can of Citrus Cooler HI-C business. Please, please, "SAVE LINK AS." It's not going to be immediately disappeared. WIRED isn't some blog. But somehow we will be made to forget. This 2MB .pdf is an immediate collector's item.

Now I like to joke that nobody reads this, and comparatively, nobody does. It's in the hundreds. And we're probably a little hipper than the average bear. That said, we still need to help the EFF. Swear to god, I just joined! I'm a pioneer, motherfuckers! Your turn.



I wish this was the link that had the AT&T log morphed into the Deathstar. But I guess that's the least of our problems.

Hoffa? Seriously, Hoffa?

Does anybody give a fuck about this? Seriously, I'm not even making a joke. The guy disappeared in 1975. America was prolly about two years from being able to sincerely ask who the fuck Jimmy Hoffa was. Fuck, who even remembers the movie Hoffa? He was apparently an asshole. Nobody liked him. Nixon pardoned him. When Nixon pardons you, you are one low bastard. Why is the FBI looking into this? Why are they talking about looking into moving a fucking barn? What's that going to cost? Look at all the Hoover boys in that picture. Posing. It's a CSI casting call. If somehow this is remotely important to somebody, wouldn't this be sort of an undercover operation? Take off those fucking jackets, assholes. Put on some overalls. Blend. Fuck, it would be better if they were dressed as KISS.

You should be fucking embarrassed. Fucking Geraldo wouldn't touch this one. For those keeping score at home... Pardoned by Nixon, invisible to Geraldo. Hoffa, if you are alive, kill yourself.

And has this case really been ongoing for 31 years? Have there been like weekly reports on this? "Okay, last thing on the agenda... How's the Hoffa case going?" Boy, talk about the perfect time to mumble. And I mean asking the question. Now imagine answering it. By about '84, it had to be conveyed through looks and the shake of a head. Like a pitcher shaking off the catcher. By about '97, that had to be a head hung waaaaaay, low.

It's good to know that there's nothing else going on in America. That the FBI can afford to investigate something that we have already explained away with our proud gangster mythology. And one last thing. When W got his morning newspapers explained to him, imagine that exchange. I'd like to think that he was pissed, but you just know that prolly the only thing he really, really knows about is In Search Of, and he was psyched as hell. If only there was some brush Hoffa could be buried under. And you know Director Skinner saw the news story and he didn't realize he was signing off on this the whole time.

I'll tell you what. These guys can listen to my phone calls anytime. Just that I'm not listed would keep them busy for months. "How's the Gilberry wiretapping going?" "He's still unlisted..."

What Happened?

I want to know what happened to this America. I hope you clicked on the link, because it's just an absolutely badass picture, but I get a real jolt describing it. So here goes. It's the commander of the Apollo 10 mission on his way to the launch gantry, carrying that briefcase air conditioner, full on hero mode. Straight up crazy padded white ninja. And on his way, he walks by Gordon Cooper's secretary, who is holding a goddamned Snoopy stuffed animal. A big one, and he pets Snoopy. She's smiling, he's smiling. Oh, and then, prolly after sitting around for half a day, he went to the fucking moon.

That should be our flag. No symbolism there. Dear world, we believe in luck and we like cartoons and hot secretaries. If you don't think we're trying to put a missile base on the moon, well World, you are naive as hell. But honestly, other than Viet Nam, we're not so bad, and just as honestly, there's some crazy shit going on there, and we just chose a side, because nobody else wanted to be on these guys' side, and we're scared to death of China. But yeah, as I go to the fucking moon, we're prolly fucking it up pretty bad over there. And fuck you, Russia. My neighbor never disappeared in the middle of the night. You really are an evil, evil bitch. USA #1!

I'd be a lot more pissed if somebody burned this picture in a protest than if somebody burned a flag. Forget indirect symbolism. This is the sort of direct symbolism of everything that was just cool as hell about us before I was born. I can imagine this whole scene as a doodle on the back of a pink "while you were out" pad, with a balloony astronaut and a lovingly detailed Snoopy. As a kid, of course I drew the rockets and the fighter planes, and whatever, but I wish I could draw the really important pictures. I wish I could draw pictures like this one. That's the story. Shooting a half mile column of fire out your ass on the wayto the moon isn't the story. It's pretty, and it impresses the locals, but damn if Snoopy, well somehow that astronaut was as inspired as all of us, but he knew the fire was the means.

Then we have this. I'm not going to harp on this. It has been well covered. Actually, this is from the 'Mission Accomplished' flight. All I'm going to say, no jokes, is that we've lost our Snoopy. By the end of my book, the only thing I want to convey is that as a culture, we have lost that sincerity. We aren't exactly 100%, 24/7 parodying ourselves, but we are a collection of images and soundbites meant to impress. It can be as simple as the subliminal link between a butter churn hanging on a wall and our need for Tato Skins and mozzarella sticks, to our most Presidential color, olive drab.

But George W. Bush never pet Snoopy. NASA people can get in all the trouble they want for espousing global warming as a fact, or stating with certainty, that the Big Bang lasted more or less than 6 days depending on your perspective, but that it definitely didn't last exactly six days, so fuck a Bible, but having this picture as the picture of the day does more damage than any of that.

You know that people like Cheney remember things like astronauts and hot secretaries and Snoopy, but they don't want us to remember. Actually, W and Cheney are the ones burning the Snoopy picture! Dicks. At best they wish it was sort of an inner-strobe light subconscious slide show that makes us associate "military" with "good." I guess it started with Kennedy, a shitty President, but prolly not a bad guy. Or maybe an asshole. Who knows. But he really did it. And ever since then, every crony politico fuckwad has sat in the background mumbling, "that war shit really plays in the sticks."

Kennedy and GBSr really did do the war thing. Of course so did McCain, and Kerry. But in McCain's case, "that 'daddy was President, too' really, really plays in the sticks." And Kerry, well Kerry was a botch from the start. A probably genuinely good man. Maybe better than Kennedy, even, which is a low bar. But he was a 100% Democrat shoehorn job, where some different fuckwad politico noted, "How do they keep kicking our ass with that war shit, considering the President's daddy is the last hero they had, and they sat on McCain like he...well they sat on him like something you sit on to hide...no, not a chair. Jesus, we suck. Rove would right away be like 'sat on him like a pineapple.' No, that was an example, but it was the first thing that came into my head. Fuck you, I know you don't sit on pineapples!"

There's just some sincerity missing is all. You don't have to study history to know it, either. Just be aware that there was a history, and that is ours, not theirs. That the President, and Cheney and Rummy all want you to forget it, so you can think of it fresh and new, as a wholly owned subsidiary of W Enterprises. TM. Here's the reality. This, and look around for yourself, is revisionist present. They just chop up a happier yesterday and arrange the pieces as delicately as a serial killer arranging clues. That's what happened.

"A fart. Sat on McCain like a fart. Yeah, of course you can sit on a fart. Well of course it's going to escape, just like McCain. What do you mean he never escaped? You're an ass..."

Terror Immunizations!!!

I swear I have seen it twice now, so I know it wasn't a dream. And neither time was during SNL, so I know it wasn't a bit commercial. But I can find no evidence on el internet. A tragedy, for sure, because I'm going to describe something so hilarious that it's going to feel so, so wrong. But it's right, dammit.

I'm not big on certainty. Certainty hurts. The most sure things are the most elusive. But the certainty I am talking about is the kind of certainty that is beyond a guarantee. It's beyond physics, and even metaphysics. What I'm about to tell you will explain this. It's not just a certainty to me, obviously. It's not just the Colonel's guarantee. This is something else completely.

Everybody knows that if you mix KFC mashed potatoes, corn, chicken strips, gravy, and a bunch of cheese in a bowl, and you eat it, you will absolutely be terrorist proof. But it was such a hassle, because you used to have to mix these together on your own, and honestly, they were usual dicks when you asked for a big old bowl. Well there is no democracy more pure than the free market. Now the KFC folk will do it for you.

This is the best thing to happen to the whole world since they found out McDonald's cookies cure Bird Flu (look at this patriot!). Soon we won't have anything to be afraid of except Arby's. Arby's hates America. There, I said it.

Fallibility

I know I got a little ranty, there. When I sent the link to the last post out to friends (personal RSS, baby, get on the list), I even mentioned that I would be a fantastic pundit. That goes on the same imaginary resume that features professional wrestling manager. See, to some that's some fallability right there, but that's because you don't appreciate wrestling the way I do. It's theater, like the grave diggers in Hamlet. It's also like Gravedigger, the monster truck (doesn't the Gravedigger guy look like Quint from Jaws?). Man, I want to talk about monster trucks now, but I gotta stay focused. All I want to say is that there must be a lot of cool as hell 80s screenplays laying around somebody's desk. "Like Red Dawn, but with Bigfoot! Imagine some Russian mangling the name Bigfoot as it runs over a line of T-72 tanks..."

Okay, I'm focused again, 100% on my fallibility. First of all, I 100% admit that I probably don't have to point out my fallibility. Catherine Zeta Jones, she has to point out her falliblity. "I was the awkward girl in school, I swear." I don't know for sure if she's ever said that, but I'd bet she has on some talk show. Every hot chica has. Ever notice the guys never say that. Like Clooney has never talked to Leno about how hard it was to get laid. It never comes up. Weird that Clooney remains infallible, but me and CZJ are mere mortals. Well CZJ is.

So far, I'm really botching this. And in the in my bean outline, I now notice that yet another girl is going to take it on the chin, but I swear we're getting to me. But first we need to warp back to 8th grade. There was this girl, Dawn. I swithched schools in 8th grade, so in order to fit in I had to do a couple things. I had to be really, really funny, and I had to get into a couple fights. Well I'm not a good fighter. One kid hit me so hard I couldn't hear out of that ear for a while. Fighting at Bair Middle was so much safer than fighting at Parkway Middle, AND I STILL LOST THE ABILITY TO TRULY APPREICATE "MR. ROBOTO" BY STYX. I never fought at Parkway. Parkway was a tough school.

Anyway, I was much better at the funny. Now I will be the first to admit that humor has changed. It used to be funny to put a rubber glove on your head. I didn't do that. Even that wasn't funny to me. I'll tell you how much things have changed. Robin Williams AND Whoopi Goldberg were considered funny. My thing, and the ladies of Bair Middle totally dug it, was to cut a mouth shape into an orange (thanks Mom, and Happy Mom's Day, too). Then I would do purposefully bad ventriloquist (before I was born, ventriloquists were funny), with the ultra-crescendo finale, me squeezing "Mr. O" and making him spit.

So one person who occasionally found me funny was Dawn. I'm not even sure she ate lunch with me, but I wasn't just funny at lunch. Then I went and ruined everything. We went to Tallahassee to learn about government. Eh. But in the Tallahassee Morrison's Buffet, history was made. I told a joke, non-orange related, that made Dawn shoot a whole strawberry preserve out of her nose. Now first of all, NO, I DON'T REMEMBER THE JOKE. Second of all, at first I thought I hurt her. Red and textured and coming out of the nose... It was an awkward moment before we all realized it was pie and not brain (I know this seems like just the sort of easy 80s joke I have been picking on, but this is reality). Then we all laughed some more. Except Dawn. Dawn never really talked to me much after that. By 12th grade, I was buying some Brach's Jelly Beans at Walgreen's, and she was behind the counter. Apparently I wasn't there at all.

Fast forward to last night. A cookout my friends Alexa and Laura were having to celebrate the end of the semester. Everybody's responsible for a dish. I had a whole plan where I was going to cut Entenmann's cake donuts in half and spread cream cheese icing. Green sprinkles for chives and voila, dessert bagels (I think Rose and I thought of this together, but if you think you thought of it mostly, then I apologize, chica). But our kitchen was being less than kitchenly while Mikey (my roommate... I assume everybody has either read my book, or knows me...neither may be the case) fixed the sink. So I went ready-made. Actually, a girl named Sara sans the H, like my prom date, but from Minnesotta, unlike my prom date, called me out asking how much space it would take to cut donuts in half...

Excellent question. I admitted that I'm the kind of person that would need to destroy a pristine kitchen to do just that. And since the kitchen was already destroyed, I bought a red velvet cake. Mmmmmm. First of all, yummy. Second of all, there's a sort of CSI/Eakins quality to the whole thing. Like you are dissecting something, because that's one healthy, visceral red. Well I commence with the consuming. They had a partyball! First of all, I was scanning the idea folder, and I actually had the line "rollin' like a partyball" in there. But I think that was because I didn't know they had partyballs still. So it was sort of kitch-y (as opposed to making an orange spit). Confronted with a real partyball, it didn't seem as funny.

So I go past comfy buzz to rambly buzz, and I don't seem to offend people. Then I spy that cake. I'm Quincy and that thing is lying on a cold, steel table. Why did that cake die??? WHY??? Well I had a generous slice, forgetting that dessert and drink are not friends in my stomach.

I get home, lay down, and I don't feel too good. And apparently type into the old idea file, "Afraid of throwing up. How will I know if I am sick...Like Dawn." Even though I didn't throw up, I guess that's about as full circle as this is going to get, Dawn. But hey, fallibility, even twenty years later we can share the wealth.

The Fallibility Scorecard: Afraid of vomiting red cake...check. Paul is fallible. Paul was watching An American President while writing this...check. Paul is very, very fallible. WAIT! Linked to Gravedigger AND Eakins? Paul is 100% infallible! Put that in your smug pipe, Clooney!

No Cavuto, It's Your World

Banking on some long odds, that "you" isn't just me, and maybe that "you" is even somebody who gives a rat's ass about Cavuto, or better, IS Cavuto, I want to talk about "fair and balanced." Or "fair" and "balanced." First of all, I'm not a usual watcher, but I was in the cafeteria at work and there you were. And you were asking Madeleine Albright if this administration deserves any credit for there not being a follow-up on American soil for 9/11. Yes cockass, W deserves credit for...reverting back to somebody's status quo. And it only took him noting every phonecall I have made since then somehow to magically ward off the boogeyman.

First of all, on that. Dear EVERY PARTISAN PRICK, it's not that I'm hiding something now. But what about in the 2009, when they decide that somebody I called in 2002 is an enemy of the your world? So now I'm an enemy too? You can write down my phonecalls if you register your guns, assholes. How about that? Yeah, didn't think so. Better yet, how absurd would it be if you had to register bullets? Well Mr. NRA, you bought 13,000 rounds in 2003, but in 2004 we were up to 21,000 9mm rounds. First of all, Mr. NRA, the metric system is unpatriotic, so you have been tagged as a UN apologist in the system. Second of all, you either got less accurate in 2004, or there's a lot of bullets lying around the farm. You guys should be soooo pissed. Every effing argument about your effing guns, that they have never been used in a crime, and you're not a criminal. Switch GUN with PHONE. Now load that phone with a hollowpoint and blow your brains out.

Second of all, we all know from Goodwill Hunting that the NSA is the bleeding/cutting edge of whatever. But I should at least be able to wrap my bean around needing to know every phonecall made and the link to terrorism. If I can't, and if Matt Damon or Stephen Hawking isn't going to be on your world to explain it to me, then screw you. God, I am so pissed.

But this isn't even what inspired me to write.

I didn't note the time, so I'm not sure the paradigm works, but after Albright, they had on a guy that thinks in response to the 1 May marches by immigrants, Americans need to boycott everything to do with Mexico. First of all, this must be like the person that comes on after Jack Hannah. Like the guy that collects Doritos or something. But back to this poor, uninformed near Wal-Mart Greeter. Even Cavuto, pretty much immediately realized this guy was a nutball. Just 100% racist ass. He wanted revenge for something that didn't even affect him in Crazyville, Wherever. And Neil gently tried to point out that making things fractionally worse won't stop people from coming to America. It might make them fractionally more likely to sweep the floor at your Wal-Mart.

But Cavuto, yeah you, Neil. In your world, this guy gets a pass. Be "fair" and get him. Be "balanced." He deserved some balance, Neil, but because he's either a) on your side, but not too articulate, or b) way beyond your side, but not on mine, you just let him ride. And yeah, there might have been a semi-wink and a pico-nod, but your network is never going to have "Fair, Balanced and Subtle" as a slogan.

Neil, in my liberal, naive heart, I want to believe that you think this guy is hilarious. That you don't want him on your team. But he is, isn't he? He's a mascot, maybe, but he's part of your world. So here's my wish, Neil. I wish that Mr. Emmisary of Crazyville just went crazy, and pulled a severed immigrant head out. "See Mr. Cavuto, this is my lucky Beaner-head." Then, prolly just for the sake of closure, we could have seen you freak out like Letterman did when the monkey dressed for a teaparty tried to grab him. That was back when he was as funny as you, Neil.