Rants & Raves: August 2006 Archives

I learned a new term recently: the War on Terra. Basically, Bush is at the center of it all: siding with oil companies, rejecting the Kyoto treaty, dismissing science in general, particularly environmental science. Hell, throw on his utter and complete (and continuing) ineffectiveness in the face of Hurricane Katrina while you're at it.

The list is long, Americans want more action and less excuses, and local and state governments are running his staffers in hundred plus degree Texas heat without proper training or supplies. Of course, he was "supervising" by riding a bike. I'm not sure who's the bigger moron: him for, well, being him, or those fools who keep following his orders.

So what ARE conservatives worried about these days? Well, some are trying to frame polygamy in the mold of a civil rights abuse. Others are firing Sunday school teachers for the "crime" of being - gasp! - female. Yet others are mutilating the Statue of Liberty in the hopes of pushing their perverse, bigoted view of religion on others.

Nice people those fascists.

Meanwhile, we're firing Arab linguists because they are gay, atheists are under the gun in our military, you can still apparently leak a CIA agent's name and NOBODY even gets a security clearance yanked, and - oh yeah! - we launched a war in the Middle East while our supposed leader who completely ignorant of the fact that there are two major sects of Islam, and multiple groups competing in Iraq.

But that's okay, according to Cheney, only a 1% chance of anything happening is enough to move on it, so says a recent book.

Sen. Inhofe from Oklahoma that UN Peacekeepers run around the world "going around teaching girls to be prostitutes." That and other idiocy from the linked article.

Randall Terry - you know, the guy behind abortion clinic bombers - is projecting a family values campaign in his run for Senate in Florida. Yeah, he's an evil snake, but you'd at least listen to a guy who is proud of his family, right? Too bad he's a snivelling piece of crap about that too. Apparently Terrorist Terry is hiding a son who's gay and a daughter who's had an abortion.

Now that's love.

I don't why this crap still surprises me, but here we go.

Republican Congressman Peter King is endorsing racial profiling as a solution to dealing with domestic terrorist incidents. FOX News wants to install Muslim-only security lines. What the hell is wrong with these people?

And we're not the only ones. A bunch of British tourists refused to board a plane until two "suspicious" looking Asian guys were escorted off. The delay was either 3 hours or a retreat to 500 years ago, depending on who you ask.

Sen. George Allen has sunk to his own brand of oblique racism, naming an opponent's staffer who follows him around "Macaca" in front of an all-white audience and welcoming him to America.

Who elects these rednecks? Never mind, I already know. Slack-jawed inbreeders.

Just a news snippet but apparently a majority of us don't believe in evolution. By us I refer to the afformentioned yokels. Refer to the chart to realize how crappy we rank against those actual civilized countries. Here's a hint: we're below Cyprus.

Normally I like NorthWest Airlines, but this goes way too far. Dealing with layoffs, strikes, and the price of fuel, NWA had taken it on the chin recently, despite every government handout to the contrary. In a booklet provided to workers recently sacked, the company essentially recommends dumpster-diving as a cost-saving measure. Now THAT'S compassionate conservatism kids.

Food news. Coffee may be the thing that causes your first heart attack. And hot dogs aren't exactly health food but a cause of genetic mutations? Sounds like a lame X-Men character bio.

A woman in Israel was saved by her breast impants during the recent conflict. I'm not saying another damn thing on that. I've got enough email.

Some commentary on the government's zealot-ridden pursuit of shutting down internet gambling. It's a link to an audio story in case you want to check it out.

When I left Vegas last Monday they were filming Oceans 13 a couple gates down from me. I even got to see Brad Pitt walking around a bit. Unusual, but that's Vegas sometimes.

Coming back home I, of course, was in the middle of the next phase of the War on Terror/Global War on Terrorism/Global Struggle Against Violent Extremism/Long War. By which I mean we enter the phase I'll call the War on Hygeine.

Not content to merely cavity searching us and marking every single passenger as a terrorist in some form, Homeland Security has decided that toothpaste and hair gel are tools of Islamofascism.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm sure there is a very logical explanation to this and I'm sure things will calm down a bit once they get a proper screening process in place. That said, you'd think that they could dial down the paranoia a bit. Or at least be rational. The threat was on places leaving Heathrow airport to the United States. It did not involve puddle jumpers jaunting between central Wyoming to Denver and then Vegas. I mean, Wyomingans treated me like a visitor from Mars. I don't want to think what an English Muslim would have to go through to even get near an airport.

In any case, I fly out again tomorrow. We'll see if the madness has abated.

"Freedom of speech is good until it gets out of whack."
- William McGlothlin of Marked Tree, AR; Bush supporter protesting Cindy Sheehan

As you can see above, Bush and his supporters are all for our democratic freedoms, at least until it gets in the way of their apocalyptic end times policies. And hey, while we're on the subject, if Republicans are so busy trying to end the world in the name of God, isn't all that rape, killing, torturing, lying, stealing, and general corruption to be considered the work of the devil? Seriously, you can't destroy the environment, kill 100,000 civilians, steal two elections, violate national and international law and still be considered a Christian, can you?

I wouldn't be able to look myself in the mirror; that's all I'm saying.