Happy Furry Puppy Story Time with Norbizness

Something Happened While The Circus Elephants Were Eating the Bread

The linked numbers will not contain footage of Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann yelling at each other, insomnia-curing transcripts of minor Democratic politicians' speeches, or Rick Astley. I swear.

(1) Over the next two years I would discover how deeply the Afghan government was involved in protecting the opium trade — by shielding it from American-designed policies. While it is true that Karzai's Taliban enemies finance themselves from the drug trade, so do many of his supporters. At the same time, some of our NATO allies have resisted the anti-opium offensive, as has our own Defense Department, which tends to see counternarcotics as other people's business to be settled once the war-fighting is over. The trouble is that the fighting is unlikely to end as long as the Taliban can finance themselves through drugs — and as long as the Kabul government is dependent on opium to sustain its own hold on power.

(2) Federal investigators probing the deadly 2001 anthrax attacks recovered samples of human hair from a mailbox in Princeton, N.J., but the strands did not match the lead suspect in the case, according to sources briefed on the probe.

(3) Led Zeppelin musicians Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones and Jason Bonham have been working on new material. Drummer Bonham told a radio station in Detroit that the songs could be destined for a new Led Zeppelin album.

(4) The U.S. Justice Department is considering a change in the grounds on which the FBI can investigate citizens and legal residents of the United States. Till now, DOJ guidelines have required the FBI to have some evidence of wrongdoing before it opens an investigation. The impending new rules, which would be implemented later this summer, allow bureau agents to establish a terrorist profile or pattern of behavior and attributes and, on the basis of that profile, start investigating an individual or group.

(5) Aw crap.

Look On My Works, Ye Reactionary Gnats, and despair!

Well, if you say so, Watchmen movie.

One of the great concepts explored by The Watchmen was the extent to which Cold War paranoia fed into the archvillain's master plan SPOILER ALERT (in creating some sort of pandimensional psychic octopus) /SPOILER ALERT to end the fussin' and a-feudin' to usher in a glorious new era of cooperation /NO REALLY THAT'S ALL FOR THE SPOILERS. A lot of the paranoia was justified, naturally, by the removal of the one strategic advantage America had (a large, bald, blue, energy-based time-and-matter-manipulator) in keeping the Russians at bay.

Well, you can't stop me (The Left) from undoing all of the good work (massive deficits, crumbling economic indicators, deteriorating environment, endless war, broken military, international reputation shot to shit) done by the Bush Administration in the upcoming election. I already have a spineless, useless Democratic Congress at my disposal and am ready to install by whatever means necessary a known hyper-centrist and his bankruptcy bill-supporting sidekick into the executive branch. It looks like the Communist utopia is only about six months away, so let's hear what the stupid-ass blog on the street thinks:
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The Left is preparing its excuse in advance for Barack Obama losing the presidential election. All together now, let’s hear it: It’s All About Race. But surely The Left is already too preoccupied with race, seeing racists under every bed. There is an issue the left is willing to let the government keep track of a citizen over: voter registration. Problem for Obama: The Left does NOT really like the War in Afghanistan, or the whole War on Terror. Considering The Left is hyperventilating and exaggerating economic woes, it seems the last thing the county needs is a VP who has firsthand knowledge of bad financial and business decisions.

While it may be clever to note that The Left is willing to sacrifice humans to protect nature, with the liberal opposition to the harmless-except-to-insects DDT, The Left really does like human sacrifice as they oppose Christianity, which ended human sacrifice in Gaul and in Mexico, but today's pagan liberal, or the Jihadist liberal, still supports human sacrifice. Yes, what lies in the [heart of] The Left is a loathing of America and Americans, a desire to watch [his] fellow men suffer. The essential plan of The Left is to consolidate control under a rubric of "the culture of peace." This apparently innocuous objective, however, can provide the rationale for a unified, totalitarian form of government.

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Sometimes I think I'm slipping until I realize that those excerpts were only a small portion of what's accumulated in a 24 hour period. My nipples are exploding with totalitarian delight!

UPDATE: The Left has been disturbed by this persistent headline on the front page of Google news all morning. Everybody I know had/has a deep and abiding respect for Kevin Duckworth, but "NBA star"? I used to routinely take him out of the starting lineup for the Washington Bullets in some Sega Genesis basketball game for Gheorghe Muresan, for God's sake!

This is the Gayest Convention Since Gayness Came to Gaytown

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You know, I'd love to hear a bunch of aspirational, vague speeches from Democratic luminaries and politicians, appended with commentary from the same goddamned thirty network and cable-news jackasses in real time, for the next several days... but, you know, the Astros haven't been mathematically eliminated yet from playoff contention (all times Central):

-- New York Mets vs Houston Astros (Mon. 8/25/08, 6:10 PM) Shea Stadium. The long anticipated Brian Moehler/Mike Pelfrey match-up. Not since Koufax/Marichal have two such dominant flamethrowers towered over the competition like the Colossus of Rhodes.

-- Houston Astros vs Cincinnati Reds (Tues. 8/26/08, 7:05 PM) Minute Maid Park. Bronson Arroyo vs. Wandy Rodriguez. I stand corrected!

-- Houston Astros vs Cincinnati Reds (Wed. 8/27/08, 7:05 PM) Minute Maid Park. Josh Fogg vs. Roy Oswalt. I wonder if Josh is any relation to Phineas? Will they play Slow Ride when he goes to the mound? I know that they've got some Flatt & Scruggs queued up for Oswalt.

-- Houston Astros vs Cincinnati Reds (Thurs. 8/28/08, 1:05 PM) Minute Maid Park. Aaron Harang vs. Galveston's Own Brandon Backe. You know, the Reds are so bad this year (especially after dumping Griffey, Jr. and Dunn) that I think they've been mathematically eliminated for next season as well.

Dammit, that last business fan's special is harshing my mellow... unless the game goes 26 or 27 innings, it will likely conclude before prime-time coverage (and its sweetly idiotic cousin, eleven hours of cable news coverage**)! Thank goodness that my new digital recording device was delivered over the weekend, which allows me to hoard, in absentia, eight-to-ten hours of uninterrupted Doppler Radar Channel programming while I'm slaving away at the East Austin Shaved Ice Emporium.

Paradoxically, the conditions that make for pushing a lot of shaved ice product (late summer, clear skies, mid-90s) may ultimately result in less-than-scintillating Doppler Radar footage. However, I won't know until I've tried, preferably while red, white, and blue balloons are being released as Alicia Keys sings God Damn America, punctuated by Barack Obama and Joe Biden's 117th awkward hug (you think it would have improved over time). You know, it's kind of like the high-fives Paul McCartney was attempting with Stevie Wonder in the Ebony and Ivory video. Look it up on YouTube your own damn self.

Oh.. and as for the Republican convention at this time next week, you're damn straight I'm gonna watch it. I'm no rank-and-file Democrat, but I'm definitely an anti-Republican, and I want to be within earshot when one of their many, pasty representatives says something hair-removingly stupid.

* Man, that picture line-up is a little disorienting!

** Oh shit, I forgot about first-person credentialed blog coverage! As to that, I'm kind of like the 1990 run-n'-shoot Houston Cougars featuring David Klingler on a 3rd-and-10: PASS!

A Note For Remaining Clintonian Holdouts

William Kristol, a man with more factual errors in his New York Times columns than nose-hairs, has a few words for you.

Bart: [upon hearing that Lisa has to miss school with the mumps] No way, she's faking! If Lisa stays home, I stay home.

Lisa: If Bart stays home, I'm going to school.

Bart: Fine, then... wait a minute [eyes dart madly as an indication of frantic neural activity]... if Lisa goes to school, then I go to school, but then Lisa stays home, so I stay home, so Lisa goes to school...

Marge: Lisa, don't confuse your brother like that.

Because, you see, Lisa really had the mumps and Kristol really is a disingenuous piece of shit that wants Republicans elected no matter what. Of course, if somebody ostensibly concerned with universal health insurance, reproductive rights, and equal pay is reading a Weekly Standard blog for electoral advice and/or self-validation, one might safely skip rational discussion and go on to a remote diagnosis of what grade concussion such a person has.

P.S. I assure you that such concussion-sufferers are not purely hypothetical.

Smells Like Rotten Cabbage and Ass-Crack Up in Here, Up in Here

The worst ever this week? I think so. I hesitate to even tell people to click on the thumbnails for a larger, context-revealing picture, because I'm not sure that would help. I do expect radical improvements from all two of you active reader-participants in the comments, but I don't expect any plaudits here. Only 4 is not a complete garbage-heap.

1. Rappin' Sergeant Grandpa, the latest in a series of failed international outreach efforts from the Pentagon.

2. That DOES it, John! You're sleeping on one of our 113 couches tonight!

3. No troops for you! Six months!

4. The perils of listening to Snoop Dogg's Drop It Like It's Hot as a warm-up song.

5. That's right. Gruff Loner With A Cockney Accent IV, out in theaters next Friday.

6. I love hypothetical "What if these two celebrities had a kid?" games. For instance, she looks like the result of some sort of implausible Bruce Willis/Demi Moore union.

7. There's Crazy Glue, and then there's Crrrrraaaazzzzzy Glue.

8. Allegations that members of the Chinese trick-riding team may have been doping up appear to have some credence.

9. By a huge margin, North Korean voters have elected to get the visage of Kim Il-Sung forcibly tattooed on their foreheads.

I mean, could #6 be any more convoluted? Does anybody do pro bono editing for people who fall below the $900,000-per-year poverty line established by Senator McCain?

And We're Puttin' It On Wax... It's The New Economy!

Four and three and two and one...

Sultan of Brunei: rich

Eldrick "Tiger" Woods: upper-middle class

John and Cindy McCain: middle class [image from one of his incalculable number of houses taken from this heartwarming article]

Some preppie jerk: lower-middle class.

99.9973% of the rest of us: as poor as Kenny and Romanian opera company employees.

But don't worry, my fellow disgusting poor Americans: the fundamentals of the economy have been pronounced "strong" by our middle-class betters. Strangely enough, these fundamentals do not include the budget deficit, the trade deficit, wholesale prices, unemployment claims, foreclosures, and real wages. Much like the fundamentals of basketball do not include dribbling, shooting, passing, defending, hydrating, or signing shoe contracts.

UPDATE: I had no idea that they gave out actual houses in Viet Cong prisons*, spokesman Brian Rogers! Judging from from the rest of his response ("In terms of who's an elitist, I think people have made a judgment that John McCain is not an arugula-eating, pointy headed professor-type..."), it appears that McCain press flacks are hired based on their ability to verbally imitate 80s teen movie antagonists.

* I spent the next three years in a POW camp, forced to subsist on a thin stew made of fish, vegetables, prawns, coconut milk, and four kinds of rice. I came close to madness trying to find it here in the States, but they just can't get the spices right!

Well Dip Me In Chocolate And Call Me a Frozen Banana

I don't travel anywhere without my own personal dumbass!

I guess that we can guess the theme of the Republican convention from its highly unsuccessful, carcinogenic dust-denying keynote speaker. Of course, they could probably save themselves the $2 million honorarium and case of scotch by simply playing this clip from Family Guy. This will probably go worse than George H.W. Bush's legendarily brief closing statement in the Diane Sawyer-moderated debates of 1988 ("stay the course, no new taxes, thousand points of light"), although that might have been Dana Carvey and Jan Hooks.

I have only deduced the probable theme of the address by a process of elimination, seeing that Power Point presentations about how to (a) circumvent Catholic marital law vis-à-vis one's cousin or (b) use city property to fuck your mistress or (c) completely alienate your children or (d) promote incompetent, corrupt high school dropouts to police chief or (e) get your fucking ass handed to you in a primary (strangely enough, only Hilary Clinton enrolled in that class) or (f) re-route citywide emergency communications through one of those "THE COW SAYS MOO!" children's toys are probably right out.

Have fun with this, you pasty collection of plutocratic, warmongering dirtballs. Maybe in 2012 you can complete your transformation by having the convention at a gender-, race-, and ethnicity-restricted orbiting country club owned by ExxonMobil with very special keynote speaker Michael Savage (who delivers it via satellite from a lower-orbiting station for Jews).

AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION: Does anyone want to try a parody of The Fall's Hey! Luciani, tailored for America's Shittiest Ex-Mayor?

AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION FOR LAZY FUCKERS: Or, just pick a name or two off of the pathetic speakers' list and make fun of them, either globally or provincially.

Mental Health Break

In light of the possible, impending invasion of Poland by Russia (Who cares? Like any war has ever been started with a Polish incursion!), several inches of rain despoiling the natural beauty of Jacksonville, Florida, the selection of the bland, milquetoast politician who will have to fill the enormous, ethical size 14 Skechers worn by Dick Cheney, and the fact that America didn't even come close to medalling in our once-signature sport (the drunken pistol-shooting and pork rind-eating biathlon), we bring you several items to brighten your dreary day, encased in a metal tomb as the "animatronic" keyboard-playing badger in a children's pizza parlor house band:

Well, you can read. Further, I have completed my drunken toddler photographic quintilogy (the last two pictures are of the same drunken baby incident, and the seventh part of the quintilogy is actually an animated .gif you can append to passive-aggressive e-mails to middle management types who cruelly made you mustard taste-tester at the Dairy Queen where you work). Click on the thumbnails for the full Flickr entry, replete with Proustian caption:

All parents involved have been indefinitely incarcerated.

BONUS: "So never ask why The Left is so hysterical and irrational, because that is the whole point. It is a way of life. You will look in vain for the 'rational end' [he is] seeking, because the emotional irrationalism is its own end." Did that unlinked person (google it if you're hard up for lo-traffic reactionary insanity) just call me a fag?

Getting Played Worse Than A Player Piano Owned by Gary Player

Just looking for an excuse to use this picture...

I appreciate the Democratic candidate's interrupting his exotic vacation to the Magellanic Clouds on a specially constructed star cruiser powered by small, first-time monetary donations to attend some sort of job interview with a megamegachurch's congregation. Here's where the audacity of hope runs up against the banality of electoral politics, as the candidate had to answer a bunch of questions from some religious charlatan wannabe power player who probably has one of those hands-free headset microphones and a book about how repeated prayer and blood sacrifice can save you 15% on your car insurance.

To Obama's credit, he at least tried to articulate some sort of spiritual basis for non-retrograde social policy to these horrible people, only to be sandbagged later on the only question that really matters to Our Invisible Masters: the sanctity of microscopic womb-parasites. I haven't been to church since I was 14 and chose to be Walter Mondale's campaign manager in our 7th grade mock election in suburban Houston (hey, we won five states), and I could have told the campaign that this was a bad idea.

I can't remember which 80s movie this comes from.. maybe it's an amalgam of several actual movies and several parodies that only exist in my head.. but the whole situation seems analogous to some nerdy kid getting a slight bit of attention from the cool kids, and then completely overplaying his hand, leading to some epic embarrassment (e.g. headgear caught on a car bumper or being laughed at while wearing only his Incredible Hulk underoos). I'm not saying that a few random concussions couldn't happen, enabling Obama to peel off a few evangelical votes, but there's something called marginal utility that his brain trust should be looking into.

I mean, fucking gross.

I Turn To Shit, When You Comin' Home, I Can't Go On*

Russian Envoy: The Soviet Union will be pleased to offer amnesty to your wayward vessel. // American Envoy: Soviet Union? I thought you guys broke up. // Russian UN Rep: Nyet! That's what we wanted you to think!

June 2001: Mr. Bush described [his meeting with Putin] as straightforward and effective. He said it was time to move beyond Cold War attitudes, away from mutually assured destruction towards mutually earned respect. "I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straight forward and trustworthy and we had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul. He's a man deeply committed to his country and the best interests of his country and I appreciate very much the frank dialogue and that's the beginning of a very constructive relationship," Mr Bush said.

February 2002: The president's decision has launched the United States on a course that will have major ramifications for the U.S. military, the Middle East's future political alignment, international oil flows and Bush's own war on terrorism. Russia and most of America's European allies have expressed alarm about the administration's escalating rhetoric on Iraq.

March 2006: The Pentagon claims that Saddam Hussein received intelligence from a Russian ambassador about United States plans and movements during the opening days of the 2003 Iraq invasion. Russia's foreign intelligence service has denied the allegations in a statement issued Friday stating "Similar, baseless allegations concerning Russia's intelligence have been made more than once. We don't consider it necessary to comment on such fabrications."

September 2007: A leading U.S. technical authority on missile defense said this week that geography and topography would make Azerbaijan a better site to defend the United States and its allies from terrorist rockets than would the locations in Eastern Europe preferred by the Bush administration. Russian President Vladimir Putin, a harsh critic of the original U.S. basing plan, has strongly pushed for the Azerbaijan site.

August 15, 2008: The United States and Poland reached a long-stalled deal on Thursday to place an American missile defense base on Polish territory, in the strongest reaction so far to Russia’s military operation in Georgia. Russia reacted angrily, saying that the move would worsen relations with the United States.

August 17, 2008: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who briefed President Bush on the fast-changing crisis over the weekend at his Texas ranch, said, "There's no doubt there will be further consequences" to Russia... Russia can't use "disproportionate force" against Georgia and still be welcomed into the halls of international institutions, Rice said. "It's not going to happen that way," she said. "Russia will pay a price."

Whoops! Looks like our time in the White House is up! Enjoy your shit sandwich, next Administration, which we now hope will be Democratic, even though we probably still hate McCain for some reason! Good Lord, we've got less credibility than a Michael Bolton gangsta rap album. Droppin' plates on yo ass, beeeeeatch!

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