Just can't stop the cuteness...

Cheese and Corn with Lorne

From the November 18, 1970 Johnny Cash Show, guest Lorne Greene (Pa Cartwright of TV's long-running "Bonanza") channels his inner Robert Goulet, mixing a dirge-paced cover of Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" with a Shatneresque reading of the hippie call-to-arms "Desiderata." You will believe it's 1969 again, and you've accidentally eaten some of the brown acid.

Fuck you AGAIN Ralph Nader

Even in the realm of politics, can you imagine a more wretched, nakedly hubristic piece of shit than Ralph Nader, once again engaging in his quadrennial display of public masturbation?

No, I can’t.

Pimping Chelsea Out

Or is it “pimping out Chelsea?” I didn’t get where I am today (Nowheresville, baby) by having a functional command of the English language or anything…

And did some poor substitute TV talking-head really get sacked last week for suggesting the Clinton campaign is ‘pimping’ Chelsea out? Come on! Not only was the poor schmuck a) on MSNBC, he was b) subbing for news non-entity Tucker Carlson, for Christ’s sake! Do you think anyone would have heard about it if the nattering classes hadn’t picked up the ‘story’ and ran with it?

That aside, let’s look at the case on its merits.

First, “pimping out” has, whether you think it’s regrettable or not, become part of the common vernacular. Another valuable contribution to youth culture brought to you by the good folks at MTV, thank you very much Mr. Redstone. (I wouldn’t mind their hastening our cultural collapse as much if they showed more music videos, damn it, but I digress…)

Second, even taking the phrase in its traditional context, it’s still accurate. Pimps run whores. It’s a whore’s job to show up, shut up, and jump through whatever hoops the client demands of her. How is that any different than Chelsea’s job description in Hillary’s campaign?

And I say this as a long-time Bill Clinton supporter (till his recent electioneering on his wife’s behalf, which still makes my nipples harden with shame).

As I’ve said, I feel the argument over whether Hillary is pimping Chelsea out or whoring her out is academic anyhow. With Chelsea actively putting her grad-student ass out there on the campaign trail, how in the name of all things soft, warm and sweet-smelling are they getting away with continuing to withhold access to her from the press? How is that even possible?? She’s up on the goddamned dais every day, grinning emptily, shaking hands and pursuing the elusive youth vote just by showing up. I think it's fucking outrageous the Clintons are still trying (and succeeding, thanks to a compliant, complacent mainstream media) in getting away with having her dodge actually speaking to the press. They're having it both ways, and it's a cheat.

I thought the Clintons billed themselves as Progressives. What’s progressive about positioning your daughter as the traditional child-who-is-better-seen-than-heard? That sounds pretty baseball, apple pie and hot dogs to me.

Get off the fucking fence, Chelsea. Fish or cut bait. Do you support your Mom for president for any reason other than she’s your Mom? Your omnipresence on the campaign trail has made it America’s legitimate right to ask. Now that you’ve accepted a seat at the grownups’ table, you’re not just allowed to talk, it’s expected.

Plus, if you opened your mouth to do more than cheer your mom’s stump speech, it would make you less vulnerable to intimations of your being ‘pimped out’ as a cheap political prop, and the charge of you being pimped out (in the traditional sense) considerably less apropos.

A Salute to Better Days

Look at our cute little president. Don’t ya just miss the roll-out of another new “Plan For Victory” every couple of weeks? All that’s missing from the photo above, from 2005, is a German translation for the slogan and a little square moustache for Our Leader. Why, couldn’t that almost be Joseph Goebbels applauding wildly in the background? All the while, the empire crumbled around them...

This photo comes courtesy of a New York Times story this morning entitled, “Army Buried Study Faulting Iraq Planning.”

Sieg heil while you can, Junior. Better days are coming soon.

Dems on way to selecting sword they want to fall on...

Since just the beginning of this week, I’ve had four die-hard Republican friends confide in me that, for varying reasons, they’re supporting Barack Obama for President. And they weren’t even peevish about it or angry; to the last one, it was almost with a giggle of excitement. They were peevish and angry with their GOP choices, no question, but there was also a joy attached to their decision to support Obama. They’re not just voting against their guy, whoever it turns out to be (don’t count Romney and his deep-pockets out yet, my friends), they actually kinda like Obama. For a Democrat, there’s something about him that appeals to them. My only GOP friend who’s not supporting Obama (see post below) is going with Romney just because he thinks Obama’s honeymoon period wouldn’t last long enough to justify his crossing party lines. That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement, and he’s the loyalist.

The only other thing they all agree on is that if Hillary is the Dem candidate, they will instead hold their noses and go down to the polls and vote their own party ticket, whoever it is, no matter how odious they find the candidate.

That’s pretty simple math. Most of the Democrats plus some of the Republicans plus some of the Independents is gonna add up to enough votes to beat any other combination out there come election day. If Hillary is not is the Democratic candidate.

If...

As usual, the only thing standing in the way of a landslide Democratic victory in November is – that’s right! – the Democrats!! Once again, proudly poised to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Even the left-leaning, occasionally bellwether state I live in gave Hillary the nod on ‘super Tuesday’ yesterday.

I’m so ashamed of my state I just popped my political-finance cherry and donated money to the Obama campaign. My friend “Dowdy” has a page with a thermometer on it and everything. After I donated, I hit “refresh” on Dowdy’s page and felt a happy tingle watching the mercury inch microscopically up from my donation. You should check it out. It’s even got a scary picture of Dowdy on the page (he has since removed the offending photo, see inset). He looks like a super-villain in his secret civilian disguise, preparing to welcome Wal-Mart shoppers all day but still thinking about ways to conquer the world after work. That photo alone is worth a $25 donation, at least I thought so.

Besides hyperventilating blog posts and throwing shekels into the ocean, what can we do to stop Hillary? Couldn’t Bill please oh please get caught with his dick somewhere it shouldn’t be? Some 527 out there has to mount an ad campaign reminding people of the double-edged sword of the gay ’90s – that the country prospered, but the political situation was poisonous and brutal and lasted from day one till the Mark Rich pardon on their way out the door. I’ll give the GOP this: they run a merry old ship. The country has gone to hell, but the party line has held on almost everything and the Dems have helped by caving on everything as it came along. It’s created unholy chaos in the real world, but its done so relatively civilly.

It should be much easier to get rid of Hillary than all the Reeps who hate her. If she was just to step aside – for the good of the fucking country – Obama would roll into office with an honest-to-god sweeping mandate. If anybody else wins, it’ll be another bitterly partisan squeaker followed by at least another four more years of Ugh.

I get more pissed at Hillary every day she doesn’t throw in the towel. If she sticks with it to the bitter end, win or lose, she’s going to drag us further into ruin. It’s like when the war with Iraq when it was brewing up. How come I could see it was definitely going to happen but she (allegedly) couldn’t? I’m growing to hate her as much as my Reep friends hate their choices.

I recommend we all write angry blog posts with links to Dowdy’s fundraising page, and follow that up by throwing a little bit of our own cash Obama’s way. Our democracy runs on petroleum-based products and greenbacks!

You know, when I first moved to this state, back in the ’80s, I was delivering pizza for a living. There was this super-hot girl who worked there (Roxanne, even her name was sexy) and she had a “FREE MANDELA” bumper sticker on her car. Now, I’d just moved in from the sticks, so I didn’t know who this Mandela was or what he’d done wrong to find himself behind bars. I made a joke about picking me up some free Mandela if she told me where to go to get it. Oh, she told me where to go... Then she told me about Mandela and apartheid and the whole thing, and I remember thinking, “Poor confused girl who’s never going to have sex with me, you’re kidding yourself. In this world, once a fascist regime gets its hands on power, all the happy thoughts and bumper stickers in the world aren’t gonna get its political enemies out of the pokey.”

And then I turned out to be wrong about that. Shook my ass up to think that sometimes, sometimes things do turn out right. I’m still a cynic, but to this day, I’m no longer completely without hope.

And I figure if I can afford to give a shit, I can afford to give $25, too. At least until Bill gets caught with his zipper down again! Let’s just hope it happens before Hillary has the nomination locked...

More Obama Electioneering

So I have this buddy who is a die-hard Republican; a swell fellow, the only friend I’ve made since moving to Christmas Island, and a real boy scout to boot. Many times he has been the Jiminy Cricket to my Pinocchio, if you know what I mean. He’s just good people.

Sadly, however, he is woefully confused where it comes to politics. And he cares about his politics with the same zeal and verbosity with which I care about mine.

So it was with some trepidation the other day when I read his email announcing his endorsement of Mitt Romney. He had actually been sniffing around Obama’s skirt there for a while, but I figured he’d stick with the party in the end. But Romney??

Anyhow, I wrote him back with an impassioned plea to re-think his position, which communiqué I am reproducing below. The Last Boy Scout’s parts will be indented, an old blogger trick I just recently learned:

I am now supporting Mitt Romney for president, even though I have some serious issues with him. I was having trouble with McCain because of some of the ridiculous legislation he has sponsored in the past, and two things pushed me over the edge today: Schwarzenegger endorsed McCain, and George Will blasted McCain (and backed up his argument nicely).

George Will always backs up his argument nicely. He could make having shit thrown at you sound like a walk in a park on a spring day in May. I love George Will. I’m glad I didn’t read his apparent endorsement of the Mittster.

I was THIS CLOSE to just saying "screw it" and supporting Obama,

don’t think twice, it’s alright...

because I think his charisma could actually bring Americans together for more rational discussions of public policies, but two things kept me from doing so: 1. He wants to bring us all together in support of liberal policies that I completely disagree with, so it would be counterproductive to the country; 2. I'm convinced that after a few months, the honeymoon period will be over for whatever president we elect, so my only reason for supporting Obama would be obsolete before we sing Auld Lang Syne in 2009.

Wow. Very pragmatic! I like that. You led with your heart till crunch time, then your brain elbowed its way in and said, “Hold on. I’m taking over here.” I agree with you about any potential honeymoon period. I’d decline to vote for Hillary in the primaries (if I could’ve) because of how much she’d energize your ‘base.’ I think there’s more people who’d vote against Hillary than vote against a black man. And in the long term, that doesn’t bode well for a Hillary presidency getting anything done other than defending itself from attack, either. Plus it would give Bill the limelight to keep getting mad in public and fucking things up.

Usually, I pick my candidate on day one, so this is a very late decision for me. And just for the record, I'm still open to switching allegiance if a true conservative comes out of the woodwork and jumps into the campaign, and if it comes down to McCain vs. Obama, it might be a voting-booth decision, since their policies would be difficult to distinguish anyway. Could depend on their veep choices. McCain vs. Clinton is a different story -- their policies are similar, their personalities are similar, but nothing -- NOTHING -- will keep me away from the polls if I have a chance to cast a vote to end Hillary's political career.

Well, goodie for you. :-) I tell you what, I’m really glad that – for a change – there’s nobody on the GOP side I hate as much as you hate Hillary. There usually is. The “Over My Dead Body” candidate. (W has been that twice now, to my impotent embarrassment.)

Personally, I’m glad you don’t have anybody better to vote for than Rom, the Space Knight (an actual Marvel Comics character from the 70s – he was a machine person… ahem). A lot of Romney’s social-agenda votes are pretty loosey-goosey in the way me and my fellow Commie-libs like. Buuut... I think he’s kinda squeaky in the ethics department. He totally changes his opinions on major issues to go with the contemporary flow. If the Mitt Romney who ran for the governor of Massachusetts met the Mitt Romney who’s running for president, they’d probably get in a slap fight, both of them weeping and demanding that the other apologize. How many times has he demanded to the cameras that McCain “apologize” for this slight or that distortion? If the nightly comedy shows had writing staffs, we’d have montages on YouTube already. My feeling is, we don’t need two pussy presidents (and their attendant ‘personal issues’) in a row.

That said, I think ol’ Rom would probably govern in a way that pissed me off less than McCain would, but it would break my heart to see this great, principled warrior John McCain go down to defeat to that flip-flopping fuck from Richie Ricvhille, Taxachussetts. I mean, seriously, Romney looks like he belongs on a dollar bill already; it’s ridiculous.

That having been said, I also think McCain is much easier to beat in the general, especially in the unlikely event that Obama gets the nod. Can you imagine the debates if Obama and McCain get the noms? Shit, even The Missus said she would watch. Even my doctor, who counts her days, consciously, as one less day left in the Bush presidency, says that she respects McCain for “having all the wrong positions for the right reasons.”

Anyhow, I can see why you’re going with Romney in the primary, but face it – if he wins and goes on to purchase the presidency, he’ll be a caretaker president, probably even if some horrible attack occurs on his watch – because we’ll blame that on Bush and Iraq anyhow.

But if you get the opportunity to throw it all out there on election day and don’t pull the lever for Obama, and he wins, you’ll know you could have been involved in a potentially transforming event in American politics, and you let it slip through your fingers.

Johnny Cash endorses Obama

“Change must come,” says the man in black in this clip from his TV show from April, 1970. I defy you to watch this performance of “What Is Truth” and tell me that Cash wouldn’t have been drawn to Obama’s message of optimism and cultural transformation. Neither Hillary nor either of the Republican candidates are going to help lead anyone to What Is Truth.

Addendum: Here's a link to that page the anonymous commenter tried to leave in the comments section. Set your phasers to “Guffaw:”
CLICK HERE