Thanks To Disney For The Wonders of Imagination

Perhaps you've heard about the lost footage of Jessica Simpson's "harrowing" trip to Iraq? It seems like ABC and Disney understand all too well that the reason we even watch her little reality show is because we've got our fingers implanted in our ears as firmly as possible when it comes to Iraq and a lot of other things. It's not Disney's job, and it never has been, to remove those fingers from our ears and force us to deal with a painful reality we'd rather not deal with. Disney has long taught us the joys and wonders of our imaginations. That's their commodity: Imagination!!!

And now my imagination can run wild in Iraq as well! Some days I like to imagine adventuring knights rescuing arabian princesses in high towers from dragons and wicked stepmothers set to an Elton John penned score. But most of the time, I imagine things more like this and this. But which vision is more accurate? I don't EVER want to know!!! Because when you lose your imagination, and thereby lose your chance to DREAM, well, that's the biggest tragedy imaginable. So thank you Disney! Thank you for the magical adventures you've brought to my mind!!!

But tell that bitch Tinkerbell she better have my scrill.

This Is Today's Open Thread #4; The I Hate Blogs Edition

Awhile back, on July 5th specifically, you may remember that I de-linked Maddox from my list of links because he's got "a bad attitude," he insulted Oasis, and as a result he's just "not the bad-assed pirate I thought he was." Coincidentally, the very next day, Maddox went on this tirade entitled "If These Words Were People, I Would Embrace Their Genocide." Where he takes his best shot at bloggers. I'm not saying I hurt his feelings. But at the same time the evidence is irrefutable. I'll admit he makes some good points, though. For instance:

Then God forbid a blogger gets mentioned on CNN. If you thought it was impossible for a certain blogger to get more pious than he was, wait until you see the shit storm of self-righteous save-the-world bullshit after a network plug. Suddenly the boring, mild-mannered blogger you once knew will turn into Mother Theresa, and will single handedly take it upon himself to end world hunger with his stupid links to band websites and other smug blogger dipshits.

I immediately thought of Andrew Sullivan upon reading that. But otherwise, it's just a silly, if entertaining, attack on an entire medium and one shouldn't bother taking it too seriously. It's the same as making fun of comic books, or people who play video games, or anything else. It's kind of amusing, I guess, but it's still dumb too. As dumb as saying all of anything is dumb. Which is the thing about Maddox that really led me to delinking him. He says a lot of really dumb stuff, and although he says it with entertaining ATTITUDE~! It's hard sometimes to get beyond the blatant dumbness of it.

Needless to say, anyway, I'm a big fan of blogs. Even the really crappy ones. Even the ones where some narcissistic dork fills their pages with lame-assed Quizzila thingies and writes about their life in a way that you can't imagine even their closest friends would bother to keep up with it. But I choose to celebrate self-expression whatever form it takes. At the very least, these are people who have made the decision to express themselves in some way, even if they're not very good at it, rather than watch television all day. And I appreciate that and applaud it. Cause, as much as I enjoy Belushi and Animal House, fat and stupid really is no way to go through life. Besides, I think what's her face who wrote that one book put it best:

"Remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird." That was the only time I ever heard Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it.
"Your father's right," she said. "Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy . . . but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."

Because these bloggers are working pretty hard and they really don't get much out of it. Because really, it's not that hard to not read blogs, anyway. But then, people wouldn't be so impressed with what a bad-assed pirate you are if you just let shit slide and went about your life. People have such a hard time with that: live and let live. I think it's because human beings are pretty much pack animals. And if something upsets the pack, then it's fair game. And if something upsets you, you feel like you have the right to yell and scream about it, and hanker for the horde to suppress it. I don't know, maybe I'm biting off more than I can chew there. But I think people pretty clearly do have a herd mentality. That's why shit like gays, abortion, plastic surgery, tattoos, Pamela Anderson, and drug use provoke the ire of so many.

But I'm getting off topic. The purpose of this post is to highlight a few things that I really hate about blogs at the moment. I made a list.

1. Cat-blogging.
Seriously, man, I don't give a fuck about your cat. If in real life, you started telling me about your pets, I would roll my eyes as conspicuously as possible and laugh in your face. I hate your cats. Seriously. They aren't cute.

2. Friday Random Ten Posts
I could give a fuck what you have in your Ipod right now. I mean, really, what kind of stance are you trying to pull here? Cause it really only comes off like yuppie scum a little too fond of their gadgets and bourgeois musical tastes.

3. Posts about how Democrats can better appeal to the red states.
Self-explanatory really.

4. "I just dug up the craziest fucking dipshit I could find on the opposing political team, and now let's all pat ourselves on the back for either a) not hating america or b) not being stupid."

5. Let's all speculate on what George Bush will do about X and why he'll do it posts. I really don't understand these posts. The most recent spate of them were the "who will Bush appoint to fill O'Connor's seat and what if Rehnquist retires too?" posts. Pretty obviously those posts are all completely obsolete now, and no one can even remember who was right and who wasn't. Plus it wasn't all that interesting anyway unless you're a really tedious person or you've got some conspiracy theories and you need a thin pretext to start pushing them.

But I don't really care, except to the extent that the people who routinely do that shit often have the most well-trafficked blogs, so they can get away with it I guess.

Here's a funny anecdote. I just used the Blogger spell-checker for this post, because I don't know how to spell narcisistic (???) and fucking Blogger's spell-checker does not recognize the following words: blog, blogger, blogging, de-linked, and a bunch of other crazy stuff. Is that Ironic? No, it's not, just funny.

I WANT TO FUCKING KILL BLOGGER

This morning I wrote a fairly long post, and just as I was about to publish it, blogger pissed off, and I lost it. I really should know better, because it's not the first time this has happened. I should remember to write shit up in Word and then cut and paste, because Blogger is such a jakey assed piece of shit. Hopefully I'll get around to rewriting that post this weekend, but rewrites are rarely as good as the first time around. The first time around you just let shit fly and it has a nice organic quality. When you rewrite, you spend too much time trying to remember that really awesome phrasing you used, and it doesn't flow as naturally. The real losers in all of this? You, the consumer.

But like i said I'll try to find time to write it this weekend. Though I'm not sure where I'll find that time as a certain medical ethics advocacy group I am a member of has decided to protest in front of the homes of prominent surgeons, waving placards with pictures of tumors and open chest cavities and whatnot, hoping to make people realize just how gross surgery is.

But for now, here are some interesting political posts courtesy of the cafe.

Josh Marshall on Republican ownership of Washington. It's an interesting point and true, but potentially backfirable. Why would you vote for someone who is admittedly ineffective? Yglesias, on the other hand, has some real goodness.

I don't know much about the American Conservative as a publication. They probably don't reperesent the highest standards of integrity. But neither do I, so I'll link to their rumor without caring about it's veracity. If true though, I'd probably be pretty outraged, but only if my outrage hadn't been beaten into a cynical pulp by the continuing stream of outrages flowing from the Bush White House. Seriously, this is probably only the third or fourth worst thing this White House has done, and it's a doozy, if true of course. And I-ran I ran so far away...

And then read the Rude Pundit on NYT's treatment of John Roberts. He's alright, though a bit angry perhaps. Billmon, meanwhile, is a better read because he's got the "just how big of a douche is Roberts, and should I care about it?" approach down pat.

Enjoy the rest of your day, and have a lovely weekend my lovely friends. And remember: "the love that you take is equal to the love that you make."

Is John G. Roberts Infatuated With Uterine Parasites?

First of all, score one for Yglesias. Good joke, buddy. I really doubt anyone will come up with anything funnier than that. But anyway, it seems as though everyone is analyzing this guy in terms of abortion. Now, I love abortion. I probably love it even more than pinko feminist hellcat does. But I have to admit that if G-Dubya won the capital to appoint anyone to the court, it's someone who believes the state owns our genitals, and has the power to punish us for using them "inappropriately." Anti-fun types have organized around the abortion issue, and they've delivered for the Republicans. It's only fair that they reap what they've sown. And they've sown a "Jesus hates fornicators" message that is now bearing fruit. It was "hella" clear in the last election, and it's been "hella" clear for a while, that Republicans are all about making you "suffer the consequences" of your "hedonistic" life style. And they won. So maybe we should all just accept this heartland wisdom. Sluts make great mommies.

But Bush did not win the right to appoint someone of the "I don't care about precedent, I just love making money (for corporations)" ilk. Of course, the morlochs did vote for him for that very unspoken reason, but the eloi, as always, are too busy enjoying the pretty "I hate terrorists, taxes and dred scott" talk, to pay any attention at all to the hidden motives before they get eaten. Nevertheless, it looks like Roberts will cruise to victory. I don't know if "we," and by "we" I really don't know who I'm talking about anymore, should bother raising a stink about it. If we can create an issue to run on in 2006, let's do it, or if we can get Bush to spend some capital, let's do it. Otherwise "we" should save our energy, because I hear thatRove is pretty fucked.

Final Thoughts on the Myth of the Nice Guy

This is a topic that apparently won't die. Of course, I'm referring to that mythological creature, and folk hero; the nice guy - destined for romantic failure, and loneliness. The poor sap who gets dumped by the princess like a cold-hearted gangsta in favor of the jerk who treats her like shit. We know you so very well, you unsung hero. Well, I suppose it's time to unleash a little bit of reality. You see sometimes when people have been in a relationship for a while, they get, for lack of a better word, "bored." Especially when they are young. They start to wonder about what else is out there. They question their willingness to commit to something without having "tested the waters" in a substantial way. Sometimes shits just not working out and someone is in denial, and they make it worse with an unattatractive clingyness due to a need for a constant reciprocation of assurance. Lots of shit happens.

And so someone finally moves on. Sometimes, in hindsight, this is a mistake. Sometimes you later realize that good people aren't a dime a dozen. And sometimes two good decent people just simply don't really belong together, and only one of the two realizes it. Sometimes it's a good move. Sometimes it's not. But it's a perfectly normal thing that perfectly normal human beings go through. It's so common as to be tedious. So why does this paricular archetype get encoded into our cultural understanding in such a passive-aggressive way? Why does on the one hand, reaction to this kind of situation, one we've probably all been through or will go through one day, become represented in the cliche, "all men are assholes?" While on the other hand the cliche becomes "women only date insensitive assholes, 'nice guys' are fucked?" I don't really know, but I'd bet Amanda Marcotte does. If I had to take a wild stab at it, I'd say it has a lot to do with people allowing their personal drama to drive them fugazi. Recent heartbreak can make you pretty misogynist, or on the other hand, whatever the big word for man-hater is. So can also, I imagine, routinely striking out with bitches that are way out of your league. So there's that stuff. Plus, you know, whatever mandypandy thinks. But why do men create something so much more passive-aggressive than woman do? I confess I'm stumped.

Hmmm....hmm...hmmm... well, we gotta put something down to make the proffessor think we at least tried, so... I think there's probably a lack of respect for a woman's agency in there. It goes back to the whole notion of seduction. The notion that there's some method short of rape to tricking a woman into copulating with you against her wishes. And that this is a very bad thing to do. Because what does a woman have, if not her purity? The scummy jerk, without any regard at all for the terrible consequence a penetrated vagina must endure, uses his powers to overcome the natural pedestalized purity of the femme in white gowns to violate the temple (Note, I'm using "temple" as a euphemism for "vadge" here. Completely novel, I know. I am most definitely a genius). He likewise uses those same strange mysterious asshole powers, which are apparently like catnip for unsuspecting women, to get her to leave her nice, decent, well-meaning boyfriend and join him on the darkside. So it's not really the woman making a decision to leave. It's the guy who's the asshole, because he's the one with agency. And what's the best evidence that he's an asshole? His total lack of regard and recognition that that particular witless and unsuspecting female had been claimed. She had been CLAIMED!!! Damn you! Even if she does have agency, what little she has, you had no right provoking!

Okay, I'm done now.

Rembrance of Things Past

Lately the Blogosphere has been aflame with that always lurking old saw about how nice guys never win, at least when it comes to scoring pussy. Both Majikthise and Yglesias have seen fit to dip their toe in this ever contentious topic. You see, this topic, when it erupts, is usually even more contentious than the super contentiousness of issues like abortion and whether guys should still pay for dates. On the one hand you have the unmollifiable resentments of the involuntarily celibate who need some, nay any, rationalization for their inability to successfully sniff the uniquely pleasant odors of the renowned genus-species snapperis femalus. And on the other hand, you got the women who just don't want to fuck those guys. I don't really find these discussions that interesting any more, but I do take continuing insult at the implied notion that I'm some kind of "jerk," because I attempt to do that most ridiculously dickish maneuver, which is to try to get laid.

The Heartless Bitches pretty much wrote the definitive texts on this debate as far as I'm concerned, which can be read here. But back when I first started blogging, I myself wrote the now definitive text on how nice guys can better approach getting ass. Once you accept the dominant paradigm of the dating world that the vast majority of the populationa adheres to, than you must accept the unimpeachable effectiveness of my advice. If you want to get some ass, this is how it's done son. Rereading this, I'm surprised at how well this article holds up, because back then I wrote with much less confidence and much more second-guessing of myself. I wrote it when I first started blogging, long before I had much of my approach figured out, and jeez I think I'm better now, but I don't deny that there have been some growing pains along the way.

"How hot and sorrowful, the machine begs for luck"

I'm disappointed by the shoddy camera work.


Things are looking pretty ominous for those poor little flags.


The text is what I sent to the Congressmen, but I did it in the blackmail lettering by cutting letters from magazine headlines and making copies. Don't have a scanner though. So I just made this cheap ass approximation in MS Paint.


Burn, Motherfucker, Burn! In the name of France


Only The U.S. Senate and 18 state legislatures can stop me before I do it again.



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The Responsible Parties.

An Unquestioning Embrace of Conventional Wisdom

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More later.