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July 19, 2005
Does Paul Begala Think I Want to Kill Him?
According to CNSNews he does:Young liberals this week flocked to the nation's capital to hear, among other things, liberal television pundit and Democrat political strategist Paul Begala accuse Republicans of wanting to kill him and his children to preserve tax cuts for the rich.Wow, that's quite a thing to say. That is, if that's what he really said. Let's take a listen...
Bush: If there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of. . . . If somebody did leak classified information, I'd like to know it, and we'll take the appropriate action.Not seeing a change in position there. A better argument all along would have been that the President should release the leaker(s) regardless of whether the letter of the law was violated. That would avoid all the legalese that aggravated many people with Clinton and might even raise Bush in the eyes of some of his detractors. Okay, that last part is wishful thinking but you never can tell.
Posted by Skayhan at 05:57 PM | Comments (0)
July 10, 2005
DON'T FUCK WITH THE U.S.
(Note; this rant was written only hours before the London attacks of July 7, 2005.)
I'm so fucking sick and tired of reading whiny-bitch opinion pieces all over the internet on how "eeeevil" the United States is. "Oh, look! They invaded Afghanistan and Iraq after 911, a tragedy, true, but one which they deserved anyway for supporting Israel, not signing the Kyoto treaty, and being richer than any other country and flaunting it by making two huge monuments to capitalist oppression against all the other civilizations of the world! Those reactionary knee-jerk flag-waving jingoists! Why don't they sit down and discuss with the people that attacked them the true root of American eeeevil?" Hey, these are not wackos like Ward Churchill making these comments; but people usually considered "rational".
Fuck YOU, cocksuckers.
These stupid fucks that decide to attack America, then sit back and scream how evil we are remind me of an idiot that climbs over a security fence and smacks a pit bull on the nose with stick. Once the pit bull rips the intruder's fucking arm off, and is rolling in the grass with the stupid twit's testicles in his mouth, the world will scream that pit bulls must be banned, because they're so violent and eeevil. That's the exact same thing going on in the world today. Don't want the United States in your back yard? DON'T FUCK WITH THE U.S., MOTHERFUCKER.
Consider just how tolerant and restrained the response of the war mongering monster, the United States, has been to these atrocities both large and small over the years:
April 18, 1983: U.S. embassy destroyed in Beirut, Lebanon: suicide car-bomb attack. 63 dead, including 17 Americans.
Oct. 23, 1983: Suicide bombers exploded truck near U.S. military barracks at Beirut airport, killing 241 Marines.
June 14, 1985: A U.S. Navy diver executed after terrorists hijacked TWA flight 847.
October 7, 1985: Leon Klinghoffer shot and tossed overboard on the Achilles Lauro cruise ship by Palestinian terrorists.
Feb. 26, 1993: Bomb explodes in basement garage of World Trade Center, killing 6 and injuring at least 1,040 others.
Nov. 13, 1995: Car bomb explodes at U.S. military headquarters in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, killing five U.S. military servicemen.
June 25, 1996: Truck bomb exploded outside Khobar Towers military complex in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, killing 19 American servicemen and injuring hundreds of others.
Oct. 12, 2000: Aden, Yemen: U.S. Navy destroyer USS Cole heavily damaged when a small boat loaded with explosives blew up alongside it.
Is it any wonder much of America turned a permanent blind eye to any mistreatment or oppression the Palestinians suffered at the hands of Isreal?
If 911 never happened, George Bush would have served one insignificant term as history's most mumble-mouthed fumpfering president. He would have been remembered with even less dignity that has been afforded to Jimmy Carter. There's no way in Hell Bush could have gained any support whatsoever to invade Iraq, WsMD or not. He would have been thrown out of office on his ass. But noooo... the great Evil West must succumb to Islamic rule of the world! So why are these pricks and the brown-nosing apologists "outraged" when Bush use 911 to invades Iraq?
All you had to do, you stupid, stupid motherfuckers, was wait 4 years until Bush 2 was out of office to start your shit. Because let's face it; that pit bull was going to get attacked regardless of who was in office at the time. Would we have invaded Iraq if Al Gore was in office instead, when 911 happened? Nope, no way in Hell. And that's why I'm glad Bush was in office when 911 happened.
I didn't vote for him; not in 2000 or 2004, but I'm still glad this reactionary little zealot was in office. Why? Because when 911 happened, I wanted the Middle East to fucking BURN. And I still do, to a large extent. Bush wants to make an example, a big example out of a mid-east country and he picked Iraq? Fine with me. WsMD? I don't give a fuck if they didn't have a firecracker between them. Want to see how much of a war mongering monster the US can REALLY be, cocksuckers, instead of whining what you imagine the US to be? FUCK WITH US. Want to freely continue to whine, bitch, moan, burn flags and presidents in effigy while claiming the U.S. is the great Satan, and not be put in the crosshairs? Don't piss off the pit bull, you fucking idiots.
Posted by Poe at 06:34 AM | Comments (0)
July 08, 2005
I love the smell of down in the morning...
(Note: Chuck’s on vacation this month, so ASVS Headline News is proud to present some Best Of columns, drawing on Chuck’s many years of success with our fine publication.)
[Column originally published August 1, 2003]
Well, I had a confrontation with a female co-worker today. It wasn’t anything I had done specifically, she was just quite pleased with a bit of scientific news that’s come out recently. Apparently some scientists think that the days of the Y-chromosome are numbered, and that eventually men will cease. Apparently she was quite enthralled by this, and felt like sharing the good news.
“If there were no more men, there’d be no more wars,” she told me gleefully. Well, I admit I just stood there. It wasn’t that I was in shock; far from it, I had any of a thousand things I could say. No, the problem was that I was not sure what an acceptable response was. You have to be careful in the twenty-first century what you say, especially in an office environment. You say the wrong thing to someone and suddenly there’s an office feud over paper clips and your boss winds up having to do something to satisfy the higher-ups that things are running smoothly. This means, inevitably, team-building exercises. They’re called “team-building exercises” because “psychological torture” is harder to spell and doesn’t have a hyphen, the business man’s friend. My like or dislike for my co-workers has no bearing on my job performance at all, because it’s my job I actually hate. All team-building would do would give me a chance to tell my co-workers how much I hate coming into work every day.
They tell me there’s no “I” in team. I agree, and I would like to remain out of it.
But I’m getting off the subject. How does one respond to a stereotypical view of one’s gender, and it is a stereotype. I can’t speak for my reader’s, but I’ve never caused a police action, troop movement, deployment, peeling of potato, or digging of a latrine, never mind a war. Admittedly I have nuked many a city in Civilization III, but I draw the line at constructing my own atomic weaponry in real life. For one thing, it’s too much like work. I have as much of an impact on international conflict as I do on the overall quality of breastfeeding in the world. But saying that didn’t seem entirely appropriate.
If one followed that train of thought to its logical conclusion, then reality takes on a twisted view. After all, just because all the men are gone doesn’t mean that the women in the United States are going to get along with the women in Japan. After all, they might be wearing the same thing we had already picked out just to be a complete bitch. What happens then? Will the military machine move? No, don’t be silly; women run the world! There will be no war! No, but we will not let such an affront go unchallenged! No, the special forces will be sent in, parachuting over Japan in bras and panties, equipped with the latest in anti-personnel pillow technology. Pink, brassiere-like parachutes will open as they descend to meet the enemy in the streets for a furious exchange of fluffy blows until downy feathers line the streets of Tokyo, only to lead to a massive street-to-street tickle-fight. Then the victors will subject the losers to the spankings they so richly deserve.
Hollywood, if you’re listening, I have a script idea for you: “40DD Over Tokyo”
Of course, this is the image that passes through my head when the all female world is presented, but I dare not give voice to it. It would be an unforgivable sin to do so. You don’t pander to the basest stereotypes about women, you cretinous troglodyte! To disgusting project that image onto all women is shameful. How typically male. Now quit starting a war and get some filing done.
Of course, one must acknowledge that men are in control of the government as a whole, but women voted to enter wars, women help design and build the weapons, women sign up to fly the planes, and women who refuse to be pandered to have pushed hard to take their place alongside men in the armed forces... not that they like war of course. If they had their way, they’d be making a bunt cake.
Why is it as a male I’m automatically attached to such items as war, but I’m not attached to something like, say, the moon landing? Only men have ever walked on the moon, yet no one ever gleefully says “If there were no men we’d have no space program! No satellite system for tracking storms and maintaining communication around the world and examining distant stars about the details of the wondrous universe we live in.” No, no one every throws comments about that at me. Instead we talk about someone like Amelia Eirhart, who was a famous explorer and then got hopelessly lost and wound up on an episode of Voyager... not the stuff explorer legends are made of. But I will not hold that up as a failing of female explorers, not by a long shot. Many a male explorer has failed in their efforts. Look at Ponce de Leon, a big failure. This guy went looking for the Fountain of Youth, and all he did was discover Florida. Come to think of it, there’s a bit of irony in looking for the Fountain of Youth and discovering the future retirement center of the continent. It’s certainly funnier then getting into a pissing contest with Captain Janeway.
Anyway, men, women, can we just forget about trying to blame each other for who wants to kill who? Can we not think about our common ground instead of giving in to petty stereotypes? Besides, I have Leonardo’s Workshop and am *this* close to a quantum bomb, so I think we’d all better just get along.
Posted by Chuck at 11:16 PM | Comments (0)
July 02, 2005
And the Rocket's Red Glare
I'm going to start this post off in typical geek fashion.
Consider Star Wars.
I've found, and this should be pretty obvious, the appeal of Star Wars is different for everyone. Some like the fairy-tale story of good versus evil. Some like watching Imperials in their pimped-out rides blow shit up. Some even like watching dudes getting hacked to pieces with a lightsaber. For me, I think, it's more the underdog aspect than anything else. I like watching a ragtag group of rebels survive against all odds and win against an overarching evil to restore freedom to the galaxy.
There's something in there that speaks to me - no, not the voice telling me to "go take a shit in the salad bar at Wendy's" - and I think that it speaks to a lot of other Americans. At least, to those who think of George Washington as more than the "dollar bill dude".
Americans can identify with an underdog story, because America is an underdog story.
As July 4 rolls around again, I recall how unlikely of an occurrence America was. Against all odds, against the might of the British Empire, we declared our independence, fought for it and won. That's an underdog story. Scrappy militias of poor farmers and rich plantation owners with poor equipment and low supplies survived, defeated the enemy and formed the beginnings of what is arguably one of the most powerful nations on Earth.
I think that's one of the greatest things ever.
Even if we did need the help of the fucking French.
...I kid, I kid.
Our founding fathers did all this, not only for their freedom, but also for the freedom of everyone who was to come. Yeah, in the start, freedom as we know it only applied to white male landowners. That was just the standard of the time, and as time progressed, so did we. And so did we amend the Constitution, as others fought and won their freedom. Sometimes with legislation. Sometimes with war. And so did freedom extend to all citizens of this nation, and so did the definition of citizen become so broad and inclusive. It was all for the greater good.
But what I don't think is good is the way things are going now.
There's a culture war going on. It's primarily "red state" versus "blue state". But it's about so much more. It's frightening to think that, in this day and age, after so much toil and blood and sweat for this precious thing we call freedom, that there are people out there willing, even furiously demanding, to pass legislation specifically to deny freedom – the Patriot Act, the proposed Federal Marriage Amendment, the Terri Schiavo case, et cetera. Perhaps it is typical. Freedom never comes without a fight, and there’s a big one brewing.
Nevertheless, freedom is still going strong. I’m reminded of that every day, because I can sit here and type this without fear of reprisal. We still have protests, and pundits, and arguments, and people willing to put their life on the line to defend such. And the good news is that legislation like the Patriot Act is eroding, albeit slowly; that those hypocrites who are willing to restrict freedom while talking about how great it is are slowly losing their grip. The fight still goes on, and we fight tooth and nail, and we gain ground. As my cohort put it, “So there's hope. Even if one still can't take a dump in a salad bar without fear of being put in a place where they make you do something completely different with their salad.”
Lovely image, Phil.
Freedom is the right to dissent.
Freedom is the right to have wild, red-hot monkey sex with someone regardless of their gender.
Freedom is the right to load up Grand Theft Auto 3 and beat up two hundred hookers with a baseball bat.
Freedom is…
As I was driving to work one morning, I saw a sign on the side of the road. It warned drivers that possession of fireworks was against state law. I thought to myself, "That's not gonna stop anyone." Freedom is…some dude named Vinny Sixpack, an American flag tattooed on his bicep, down on the corner with a few cakes full of fireworks, a butane lighter and enough rebelliousness to flagrantly violate state laws just to celebrate the birth of the Land of the Free.
There's something almost poetic about that.
E Pluribus Unum.
Happy 4th, folks.
Posted by Dalton at 06:45 PM | Comments (0)