There's Something Strange About This Headline

But I can't quite finger it.

What the Fuck?

If someone could point out to me why my goddamned cat keeps licking my - freshly-cleaned mind you - overcoat I'd be grateful.

Depravity Unbound

I think you have to be a fairly awful person to giggle when you listen to Teddy Bear by Red Sovine.

"Now, I'm not supposed to bother you fellas out there,
Mom says you're busy and for me to stay off the air.
But, you see, I get lonely and it helps to talk
'Cause that's about all I can do. I'm crippled and I can't walk."

I came back and told him to fire up that mike
And I'd talk to him as long as he'd like.
"This was my dad's radio," the little boy said,
"But I guess it's mine and Mom's now 'cause my daddy's dead.
Dad had a wreck about a month ago.
He was trying to get home in a blinding snow.
Mom has to work now to make ends meet
And I'm not much help with my two crippled feet.
She says not to worry, that we'll make it all right,
But I hear her crying sometimes late at night.
You know, there's one thing I want more than anything else to see.
Aw, I know you guys are too busy to bother with me,
But, you see, my dad used to take me for rides when he was home
But I guess that's all over now since my daddy's gone."

You probably have to be even worse to think what I think about this:

And as I rounded the corner, boy, I got one heck of a shock--
Eighteen-wheelers were lined up for three city blocks!
Why, I guess every driver for miles around had caught Teddy Bear's call
And that little crippled boy was having a ball.
For as fast as one driver would carry him in,
Another would carry him to his truck and take off again.
Well, you better believe I took my turn at riding Teddy Bear
And then I carried him back in and put him down in his chair.

Let's Say There's a God

Do you think we can get him to submit to a medical exam, then clone an evil one and have him fight himself for universal domination?

These are the kinds of things I think about when people start talking about religion.

Why Have I Missed This?

Metalocalypse is right up my alley. I'm officially excited, especially since I loved the metal bits from Home Movies.

I Got Mine, Jack

Michael Medved:

The only valid, sensible way to judge a President involves an evaluation of whether the nation thrived or suffered under his leadership.

The rest of the world is not a consideration.

What the heck, why not UPDATE?

UNICEF: U.S., British children worst off in industrialized world
By Associated Press
Wednesday, February 14, 2007 - Updated: 11:18 AM EST

BERLIN - The United States and Britain ranked at the bottom of a U.N. survey released Wednesday evaluating the well-being of children in wealthy countries.
The Netherlands topped the report issued by UNICEF, followed by other European countries with strong social welfare systems - Sweden, Denmark and Finland.

[...]

The Velvet Smog

Did I see this first on Boing Boing? Probably, but I'm too lazy to check.

That's Good Enough for Me
Cookie Monsters of death-metal music.

BY JIM FUSILLI
Wednesday, February 1, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

While the extreme branch of heavy-metal music known as death metal is defined in part by often-vile lyrics about violence, catastrophic destruction, nihilism, anarchy and paranoia, its singing style is associated with a beloved goggle-eyed, fuzzy blue puppet.

Death-metal vocalizing is also known as Cookie Monster singing, if not in tribute to, at least in acknowledgment of, the "Sesame Street" puppet that blurts in a guttural growl, his words discharged so rapidly that they tend to collide with each other.

All this was news to people at Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization behind "Sesame Street." "We have nothing to do with it," said Ellen Lewis, vice president of corporate communications. "What is it?"

"It's a whole new thing to me," said Frank Oz, who originated the voice of the Cookie Monster. "I've never heard of it."

[...]

Handjob for D'Souzaphone

Ooh, slappy fight!

Why are some conservatives so determined to let liberals off the hook for 9/11? For the past five years, leading pundits on the left have blamed American foreign policy for the blowback of Muslim rage that produced 9/11. In my book The Enemy at Home I turn the tables and say that it is liberal foreign policy and liberal values projected abroad that are largely responsible for this blowback.

In a recent column, Victor Davis Hanson charges that my argument puts me in the category of leftist author Susan Sontag and fundamentalist preacher Jerry Falwell. Sontag blamed 9/11 on “specific American alliances and actions.” Falwell said 9/11 was God’s punishment for America’s sins. Both seemed to imply that America deserved it.

But this is not what I say at all. My book asks a completely secular question: why did the guys who did 9/11 do it? Five years after this event, it’s not an unreasonable question. To ask it is not to “justify” the attacks any more than to ask whether British appeasement of Hitler prior to his invasion of Poland “justified” that invasion. Explanation is not the same as justification.

"But this is not what I say at all." I remind D'Souza of the title of his book: The Enemy At Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11. And what General Handjob said was

But D'Souza's strained effort to fault millions of Americans for 9/11 proves no more convincing than was Susan Sontag's or Jerry Falwell's.

He's just saying your blaming is as stupid as theirs, not that it turns around the same, uh, axis.

(I should add here that it's been a long time since I read the Sontag piece, and I do not recall craziness within it. I'd look it up, but time to go.)

I Like This Song

"I believe that is called al fresco" is a very funny line.

I Really Enjoy Althousian Hijinx

Thanks to Thers and Scott at LGM, this post by the incomparable Althouse has me giggling like a schoolgirl. I confess to some minor trolling. Gotta stop that and remember to confuse Max the cat instead.

Burdened By Vanity

Via Pharyngula:
Your results:
You are Dr. Doom

Dr. Doom 71% Mr. Freeze 67% Magneto 61% Apocalypse 56% Lex Luthor 56% The Joker 56% Venom 53% Juggernaut 50% Dark Phoenix 48% Catwoman 45% Poison Ivy 42% Kingpin 41% Green Goblin 38% Two-Face 34% Riddler 32% Mystique 26%

Blessed with smarts and power but burdened by vanity.

Click here to take the Super Villain Personality Test

This looks great in preview but really stinks as published (according to my Mac/Firefox combo). So what the fuck, I blame my vanity for leaving this crap up.

Victor Davis Hanson on D'Souza

Well I'll be:

D'Souza's solution is for conservatives here to embrace conservative Muslims, in a shared struggle against both the American left that misrepresented us and the jihadists who now misrepresent them.

But D'Souza's strained effort to fault millions of Americans for 9/11 proves no more convincing than was Susan Sontag's or Jerry Falwell's.

We Are All Alfabetizadores

Thanks to Google.

Irony Alert

Liberals Don't Ask "What Happens Next?"
By Dennis Prager
Tuesday, February 6, 2007

In general, the Left does not ask the question, "What will happen next?" when formulating social policy. Not thinking through the long-range consequences of their positions is liberalism's tragic flaw.

Compare and contrast:

The Lone Ranger rides again
By Dennis Prager
Tuesday, March 11, 2003

Let it be said before we know the outcome of the war in Iraq that America and the world are inordinately lucky to have George W. Bush as America's president.

Malkin Screenshot Contest

1. john said,

   February 6, 2007 at 3:56

   Let’s have a contest. Who can come up with the best screen capture of malkin.

Seems like an okay idea to me.

Nyum nyum nyum nyum must eat cardboard and run on wheel nyum nyum.



If I was an elderly pederast I would totally fuck Will Robinson.



Dafydd ab Hugh, that's a biohazard!



It's the expression of what's inside of you that makes you beautiful.

Quoth the Joker in the Blue Cape

Ah, the internet. Is there anything it can't steal?

Nicer than Christ

It's Time for Conservatives to Take Comedy Seriously

[...]

Look, as far as comedy goes, Mr. and Mrs. Conservative, you must bow and kiss the Left’s ring. They slay us. You can count on one hand how many conservatives are making a semi-distinct blip on the comedic scene. Who do we have? Dennis Miller, Brad Stine, Julie Gorin, and ________ . I had to google “conservative comics” just to add a third person to that list.

[...]

What’s wrong with us? We’ve become nicer than Christ.

Seuss Deserves Better

“It’s a pretty good war”
Said old Wingnut McSnore
“And the fellow who runs it
Seems proud and cocksure.”

“But if I ran this war,”
Said old Wingnut McSnore
“I’d make a few changes
And give Eye-raq what for.”

The weapons and airplanes and that kind of stuff
They have out there now are not quite good enough.
You see things like these in just any old war.
They’re awfully limp-wristed. I want stuff with more gore!

A one-barreled gun is not that big a deal.
The guns in my war have five barrels for real!
They’ll flay off the skin of an Arab tout suite
And the guy right behind him will end up chopped meat.
The kid behind that will be holy as Swiss
And send out the hearse for that lovely young miss.
The pundits back home will smell blood and be drooling
“That Wingnut’s not kidding! He’s really not fooling!”

My Gore War, McSnore War, will make people talk.
My Gore War, McSnore War, will make people gawk
At the bloodiest victims that ever did walk,
Or stagger or crawl or wheel ’round in a chair,
And my tank will just roll like they’re not even there,
Squishing their guts out with style and with flair.
The boys back at home will all wish they were killing
With tanks with neat drink holders to stop any spilling!

Comments I Wish Were Mine

1. steve_e said,

   February 3, 2007 at 20:27

   “I wonder what the Wingnut version of the E-meter is…”

   You twist a radio’s AM dial. If you find a wingnut without knowing the area’s right-wing radio stations beforehand, you are a Clear.

WBUR Feed

Follow the link for WBUR in Boston, which is likely to re-run the Molly Ivins interview I'm listening to.