Makes Me Almost Want to Vote for Hillary

Fred Thompson should be hired by Hillary, because seriously, I think the Clintons aren't the best people and he makes me want to vote for Hillary. (Don't worry Obamanistas out there, I'm still with you.)

Thompson said, paraphrasing here, "There is no women on the horizon who ought to be President next year." Ok, I realize the guy probably just means Hillary, but nonetheless, what a truly dipshit thing to say.

Thompson's full quote.

Iraq is Wonderful, That's Why You Don't See It On TV

I just knew we were making real strides in Iraq. What with Bush's upbeat assessments and the little coverage the US MSM has provided this year, could you really doubt progress has been made?

Damn Juan Cole and his party-pooperishness. What a dick this guy is. Like I'm supposed to believe some internationally renowned professor on the Mideast rather than CNN and Fox. Well, you all know where I stand. I'll state it again. Go USA, BEAT EVIL! ...AND TERROR!

Nonetheless, I will be fair and balanced and provide you with Professor Cole's supposed 10 Myth's About Iraq in 2007. Go be depressed all you anti-Americans.

3 Doors Down Propaganda

Everyone is all up in arms about some "Citizen Soldier" crap playing before some movies recently. I can't recall if I've seen it, but what I don't get is why this is news to anyone.

I can't have been the only one who noticed the nauseating flag waving in the 3 Doors Down video being aired before the Iraq war. Remember, they were on a carrier? "When I'm Gone" was the name of the song? Well here's what one of the 3 Doors dipshits had to say at the time:

"We're not promoting violence against people of Middle Eastern decent that have nothing to do with [September 11], but at the same time, we wrote a song that's basically about going over there and kicking their ass."

So yeah, Citizen Soldier is propaganda. Big surprise. These guys apparently get cut checks by the DoD...real artists, I'm sure. Of course, maybe I'm too cynical, maybe the band is just a bunch of morons and the DoD just found them and paid MTV or whomever to put the song in heavy rotation. Who knows.

All I know is if their music wasn't shitty enough to make you hate them, now you have this.

These Whacked out Iowa Caucuses

So there are like 1800 or 1900 precincts...in Iowa. Among them are like 3000 delegates. On caucus night you show up at your local precinct and walk to a corner of the room for your candidate. If your candidate doesn't get more than like 15-25% the candidate is "non-viable" and then there is a 30 minute reorganizing of voters to the "viable" or "undecided" camps - this is where the nonsense comes in.

Say Hill decides she can't win in Iowa but wants to sink Obama. Well, she can tell her delegates to caucus for Edwards who then would be guaranteed victory. Forget the fact that he'd be supported by people who don't actually want him to win the nomination.

Crazy ass system.

Smoking in the Mall

Anyone else noticed this? Every year, and it never fails, you get these bullshit stories about Christmas sales being down from the year before. "Nervous retailers wondering if people will come out at the last minute..." Nonetheless, it seems like most years there are improvements in the amount of money spent when it's all tallied.

This all makes me wonder. Do you think there are Better Business Bureaus or Chambers of Commerce (or whatever) that float this crap every year, or is it just a story lazy news casters use to fill what would be dead air? (Couldn't you always find some shop that's doing poorly? I mean this year it wouldn't be Mylie Cyrus of Hannah Montanta fame, but what about the Disney cut out that came before her...the one with the dimples...whatever her name is? Do you think her sales are going through the roof? I doubt it.)

And if this is a retailer's strategy, it's kind of interesting. Normally retail markets shit we don't need by claiming everyone has to have it. Here it's like the opposite. No one is buying, so we expect you come out and save Freedom and Liberty by buying the latest Chris Brown or Fallout Boy nonsense. It's like reverse mental jujitsu.

I'm sorry, I don't feel sorry if the malls aren't crowded. But I'm so anti-establishment hip you'd know this by now.

We do need to bring back smoking in the malls. Smoking everywhere really. Just have the special locations for it...and not all walled off with glass partitions. Just little areas set aside.

Finding Porn on Your Partner's Computer

Okay here's an article about a girlfriend who finds porn on her boyfriend's computer. I've read these stories before and frankly haven't cared enough to read. But, I found this on Digg.com which is a web 2.0 meta-link site. The person who posted the story wrote a sensational tagline, like, you HAVE TO READ THIS!. So I figured it would be funny, or at least kinda, you know, different than what one might expect to find in a 700 Club newsletter. Well, I was wrong.

Leave out the power of Jesus to smite out the Satan worshiping meat beaters, and this poor woman's blog post could indeed be mistaken from something churchy (although not Catholic, because they must have a Saint of onanism as they do everything else). The surprising thing for me is the prudishness of the woman who wrote it. She goes on for four damn pages of blog about how she came across the porn (no fault of her own...I'm calling bullshit on that part), that this wasn't her first *OMG* time finding porn on a partner's computer, and it's taught her an important lesson. Let's deal with some of these from my perspective.

Let me preface this, in case you don't know me, I don't exactly have traditional views. I may not own Dildo World, but even though I'm straight, I have no problem with bisexuality - although strangely fashionable amongst women under 25 these day, so much so, I read "bi" and I just roll my eyes and think "there's another girl trying to be too school for skool, predictably rebelling against holy-roller parents, destined to return to church and refuse to let her own daughters date before age 16"; polygamy is fine as well, just not for me as it seems shallow, these are the swingers and nudist colonizers of the 70s all over again, feel free to laugh at them today; BDSM I don't much get, sex and pain are anathema to me - I might tie a girl up if she asked me to...but only because I can sort of understand the weird test of trust (you had the chance to rape me with a can of cheese whip, but you didn't - you really love me honey!). All that said, the evil alternative lifestyles are fine in my book, I don't give a damn what consensual adults do together. If it makes me laugh, all the better.

So, my personal take? I say bring on the vibrators and make use of them in the bedroom. I'm not some porn star and sometimes my saliva and tongue would rather give it a rest - jaw and tongue soreness, sexy. Girls deserve their orgasm, so why not make sure that happens each and every by bringing toys? I'm not going to have trouble getting mine, the least I can do is make sure she does as well. So, quickly onto this article.

This woman's blog post reminds me that EVERYONE is blogging these days, even "traditional" people (as she refers to her own sex - the holy kind Jesus loves apparently). And traditional to her means no toys and it sounds like she thinks missionary got its name straight from the Holy Roman See (which is totally true, except the new evil-Pope is going back to Latin, so be on the look out for slight name change). So I guess I know there are these girls are still lurking out there and haven't gone away (I thought the Internets were a sin to these types, guess not), but I just didn't think they were web-savvy types. I do note, her blog is over done with girly fonts and enough whitespace for a tampon commercial - someone has to design the website for Better Homes and Garden. But these points she brings up are just plain fucked up.

She's a year and half into dating some guy and hasn't discussed doing anything but missionary? She's "shocked" - I tell you!- to learn he likes porn. She questions her own adequacy (and sounds like she should) and then writes a screed against the boyfriend for not being more open. She is liberated, she admits *OMG...again* he caught her masturbating...in her sleep!...damn you demon succubus! She may consider "tantric sex," thanks to her intimate knowledge from local yoga class. (Sorry to burst her naive bubbly but she ought to look into Tantra before she says she wants it, my guess is she'd go to ground convulsing and start speaking in tongues if she really knew what it is - Tantra is high-level Buddhism wrapped in Hindu tradition where the Gods were some kinky mofos). Undoubtedly she means trying out maybe two new positions form the Kama Sutra rather than role-playing Tantric deities and such.

The comments on her blog are interesting. Half seem to be from angered, pornoholic men (why the anger?...perhaps the Beastie Boys need to reprise "Fight For Your to Party" with "Fight For Your Right to 'Bate"); then you have the porn is an addiction crowd (I'm willing to concede it could be for some, since beating the chicken is pleasure inducing - but these people seem think not only is it an addiction, but one worse than alcoholism or sodomizing the family dog); and, of course, her amen corner of regular readers.

Another issue I have this ladies' concerns are the automatic questioning she feels obligated to ask. Because she found porn she feels justified to ask if the guy is into kiddie porn, bestiality, or if she just doesn't interest him enough. Let's get a grip here. I mean if the guy is on some site, XXXdogporking.com, or XXXkiddiepornworld.com (and YES, I'm a member at both! - no, seriously I just made those up, so if they happen to be real I apologize, I'm not trying to promote), but if he had sites like that, well then it would be fine to ask him or simply make the logical presumption and leave the guy ASAP. (My guess is this type of chick is the let's go to counseling and buy some Dr. Phil books type). If all we're talking about is porn though, asking about kiddie porn and sex with animals is just fucked up.

Finally, why would anyone wait a year and a half to discuss this shit? Moreover, why is the guy hiding this? I have friends, man and wife, who've found themselves in the same situation as this lady. More importantly, their respective reactions were very similar to what this woman describes. Hiding the porn, porn found, guy embarrassed, girl questions if masturbation is allowed in marriage... Well color me confused, it simply isn't something any couple needs to hide (although you don't need to inform each other every single time you beat the one eyed burping gecko or turn on the vibe). Couples certainly shouldn't care about this stuff, except maybe to get new ideas to spice up their love lives.

So, what's your opinion? Have at it, and weigh in.

Long-Term Liberal Planning

Yesterday I was thinking about No Child Left Behind (NCLB) and its ideological underpinnings. Before I go into just what I was thinking, let me give you a quick and dirty overview of the act. The overtly stated purpose of NCLB is to better education. It goes about this by requiring yearly testing between grades 3-8, and 11, requiring both schools and districts, separately, to meet state defined standards. These standards must divide students into subgroups along ethnic lines, as well as special education status, and then mandates that each school "meets or exceeds" across all subgroups. If any subgroup fails, the entire school fails for the year. As written, NCLB is phased in over time, eventually requiring 100 percent of students to meet or exceed state standards in all subgroups. Failure to meet meet or exceed means the school has failed to make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) towards the ultimate 100 percent requirement. If a school continues to fail to meet AYP, funds can be withheld, schools privatized and eventually closed if need be.

NCLB is extremely deft legislation aimed at achieving a covert goal - destruction of the NEA and AFT unions. The act does this by putting children's education as a stated goal, sets impossible marks for schools to meet and then allows for punitive actions which attack unions once schools fail to meet the unachievable standards. The Act is especially clever as it is phased in gradually over more than a decade before the percentages become truly onerous where most (if not all) schools will fail to make AYP. This allows for NCLB to insidiously infect the school system, generally fooling the public into thinking it has education as its real goal. Of course this isn't the case.

NCLB targets large, powerful, labor unions who work against the GOP agenda. It does this by claiming to be for the kids, but then makes requirements impossible to meet. When schools don't meet these standards, union protections go out the window, allowing for the dismissal of tenured teachers, promotion of non-unionized, private schools, and, finally, shutting down public schools altogether. Perhaps you believe I'm being too harsh on NCLB, but one simply needs to read the provision requiring 100 percentage passage across every subgroup to see, if anything, I'm understating what NCLB sets out to achieve. Ok, so how does this impact upon liberal long-term planning?

It's my conviction that after carefully examining NCLB one can easily see the ultimate goal of union busting pretty easily. What isn't so obvious is the long-term thinking and vision of conservatives required to formulate something like NCLB. And, NCLB is not alone. NAFTA and joining the WTO have been long-term strategies to cripple American unions by forcing American labor to compete with labor of Mexico (for example) where labor law is far lacking. Other attacks on the liberal agenda include "reform" of welfare, the attempt to destroy social security and the erosion of antitrust protection. There are many other instances, however I think these will suffice for now.

When taken as a whole, the conservative agenda is sweeping in its aims, its success and the time frame over which it has been, and continues to be pushed. This brings me to my question: Where are similar Liberal strategies? Where can one look and find long-term planning which attacks the fundamental support of the Conservative agenda? Where are they and why haven't they been pushed?

It's obvious Conservatives have an easy target, we call it the New Deal or the Great Society. Although conservatives strike at these programs directly, such attempts almost always fail as the programs are popular. Conservatives have been forced to retreat to a the think tanks and develop long-term projects to achieve their aims. After 30 years of Conservative success along these lines, whether it's NCLB, or media conglomeration, free trade with companies lacking labor policies, or simply the continued growth of the military - Liberals have not formulated their own plans to go at the underpinnings of the conservative agenda. So what might this look like?

I haven't had a great deal of time to think these through, but the first step must be to identify the roots of the Conservative agenda, i.e., what is it about Conservative ideas that makes them popular. Ideas that jump to mind are cheap goods, easy-but poor - employment, private schools/segregation, corporatism, nationalism, militarism, gun rights, bringing Christianity closer to the government, and demonizing governmental regulations. I don't have immediate solutions, and I'm sure my list is far from complete, but Liberals need to think long-term, just as the conservatives have if Liberals can hope to influence future policy. What to do with these? That's the next difficultly.

It's taken Conservatives 60 years in some cases to figure out ways to package their ideas to make them palatable. They've had half a century of people committed to bringing down the New Deal. The Liberals need the same tenacity and planning. Some policies jump to mind however. With the military being so abused and taking so much of the budget, an NCLB for the DoD wouldn't be a bad idea. If teachers have to show results on far less federal dollars, why shouldn't the military have to meet goals where every soldier is paid like their civilian counterpart, that those in the military have to pass tests equal to free-market jobs, and that military contractors be held to 100 percent standards (or else lose their right to bid). More directly, unionizing the military would be a great, long-term strategy to consider. Media must be opened up for compeition, this seems like an easy enough policy to sell. More later...

High School Musical 2: What the Hell?

Okay, so the whole High School Musical aka Disney Crack, caught my attention when I was subbing 6th grade last year. I had never heard of the movie before the day I subbed, but for the kids this was old hat. All the girls in the class knew ALL the words to ALL of the songs (and most had dance moves...). Even the boys in the class had all seen it. What the hell happened?

It turns out that HSM 1 was Disney's most watched thing of all time. I don't know how they promoted, where they promoted, but somehow this made for cable movie got like 11 million kids to tune in - and that was before the release to DVD. So Friday night we had the premiere of HSM: 2. Did it do well? Try nearly 18 million viewers, the most watched cable show ever. The Sopranos finale had near 12 million viewers in comparison. This really is something else.

I've only seen the first movie, and I can vouch for it sucking. It is exactly what you would expect it to be, perhaps worse. It looks like every other show to air on Disney. The lighting in perfect, everyone has perfect skin, everyone dresses in new clothes and has blindingly white teeth. All races are represented, much like the Village People except without costumes. The songs weren't special. But, I'm not their target audience, obviously, and they did something right.

Here's a link to an article about the hysteria surrounding HSM2. I also caught a little bit about this on NPR Friday, and that reviewer predicted a Broadway version. I'm sure that's correct, but I'd be equally surprised if there isn't a Hollywood release coming next year. Does anyone have any disturbing experiences surrounding this bizarre craze? ...Or maybe just theories or anecdotal reports about the greatest thing since Debbie Gibson and Tiffany?

Superbad a Tad Over-Hyped

I caught Superbad with some friends last evening and figured I'd post my thoughts. Most of my friends really enjoyed the film, probably more than I did, so take my opinion for what it's worth. I wouldn't say Superbad isn't worth seeing, but I definitely don't believe it's "iconic" or a "defining film of the generation," labels I've heard bandied about.

Superbad is basically a better American Pie. It's smarter, far more vulgar (hence true to life), the dialog is far superior and the overall atmosphere is well achieved. Since many people just love American Pie (another film I thought was ok, but not great), perhaps this is enough of an endorsement, but I had some problems.

For some reason, the pacing in this film is off. I found myself bored and looking at my watch several times in the film. Probably 10 minutes of tightening would have made this stronger. The plot that is there, is simple (and that's not an issue) but it lacks a moving dynamic. Fast Times could get away with this because it didn't tightly narrow it's focus on 3 characters and a single night partying. 1998's Can't Hardly Wait, which also focused on a single night of grad partying, is what Superbad might have been if it would have been a touch more realistic. Teenage romance is funny and I felt like Superbad tried a little too hard to be puerile. Superbad, for all of it's entertaining dialog only uses the main characters as simple cutouts. You never really care about any of these principal characters which hurts the film. The premise is 95 percent on dick jokes and losing virginity, they tried, but missed a real human connection with the lead actors. Another problem is basically no female presence in the film, except to provide sexual objects for our heroes. None of this makes Superbad, bad, it just was a touch disappointing. All that said, Superbad did do quite a few things right.

The trouble getting booze, ending up in strange parties, dealing with odd characters, running from cops, and preoccupation with sex did remind me of countless nights in my own high school past. Although I had many crazy nights in high school (as most of us did), the movie's quest to get booze and hook up with girls was true to life. The social awkwardness, the irresponsible drinking - all of that is captured to a degree that, like all good high school movies, made me a touch nostalgic for those crazy days of wild stupidity. Any movie that can elicit those feelings (almost a little depressing) must be fairly good.

In the end, Superbad gets a lot right, but feels like it missed out a little. Perhaps if the trailers hadn't given away as much as they did, or if the reviews weren't quite so positive, I wouldn't have went in with such high expectations. I went desperately hoping for a Fast Times or a Can't Hardly Wait, and I got a better version of American Pie. No doubt, some will love this movie like no other, it is good, but it's not all it might have been. *** 3/4 stars.

What are your thoughts?

ACLU Targets Reid and Pelosi over FISA

Post 1201!

This is why the ACLU kicks so much ass. The Democrats rolled over for the Bush administration regarding new powers to thwart FISA and now the ACLU is going after them for it. I'm still at a loss as to why the Democratic leadership went for this. It makes no sense.

We've already discovered that Bush was caught breaking the old FISA wiretap laws. We also know FISA has never been onerous. In fact, all FISA ever required was that AFTER 72 hours of unapproved surveillance the government was required to go before a secret FISA court and present evidence their targets were legitimately related to foreign intelligence. And it isn't as if the FISA court has turned down many requests. Although I can't remember the source or exact numbers, I believe the FISA court had turned down 19 warrant requests out of something like 19,000 presented since FISA was created in the late 70s. If you were the government, you couldn't lose. Nonetheless Bush ignored and broke the FISA statute. It's even puzzling why he chose to do so.

Given that you don't even need court authorization under FISA to wiretap for three days, and given how easy it is to obtain judicial approval, why the hell has Bush ever fought this? I can only speculate.

Did Bush circumvent FISA because he plans (or was) using FISA to wiretap ANYONE and EVERYONE (...essentially, does the Bush administration really not believe in the Fourth Amendment)? Was this some dumbass attempt to push the limits of the "Unitary Executive/Presidency" theory expounded by Cheney? Or was this simply a case of trying to paint Democrats as soft on terrorism?

Whatever the reason, Bush has a long history of abusing FISA, so much so, I've heard at least one Constitutional Law scholar (Turley of GW, I believe) suggest these violations are, and should, be grounds for impeachment. So this isn't minor stuff unless you really don't care about any right to privacy (meaning you don't care much for the Bill of Rights). This latest Democratic move to weaken FISA at Bush's request is even stranger than Bush ignoring FISA in the first place (and, personally, I believe FISA violates the 4th Amendment as it had stood, even if Bush had chose to follow it). As I posited above, Bush at least had some reason for wanting the law changed. So what could have motivated the Dems to go along and broaden FISA, giving people like Gonzales even more power?

A few theories. Theory 1: The Dems are over-confident about 08 and only fear being painted as the party of pussies by the GOP. This is the traditionally, defensive, fear-based, GOP-defined frame Dems often fall prey to. The Democrats are not pussies, at this point with Bush's wars going so wrong it might not matter if people thought that anyway, and most importantly, the GOP will STILL call them pussies. The Dems could authorize the carpet bombing of every country in the world in the GOP would still call them the party of national surrender.
Theory 2: Bush's team has dope on the Democratic leadership and are using it for leverage. No way to know we can verify it, but something has to explain why they went along with the, apparently, toothless Bush. Theory 3: Dem leadership have good intel that we're going to be attacked in soon and don't want to be blamed for it. No way to verify this one either.

Nothing makes much sense, so I'm glad ACLU is going to pressure Pelosi and Reid. There simply is no excuse, at least made public, that rationally explains this nonsense. Congress ought to be impeaching Cheney and Gonzales (low hanging fruit) not giving Bush what he wants. Congrats to the ACLU.