Pox News

Sesame street spoof Fox as Pox news. They'd already lampooned CNN as the GNN (the Grouch News Network - before Lou Dobbs left) and no one cared, but Rupert can't have the Children's Television Workshop trying to corrupt the minds of young Republicans... or at least the mind of children of young Republican parents who neglect their children to go off an blog about how terrible CTW is.

Incorrectly, I believe, PBS apologized to Pox.

Huffington Post's take on it is here.

But, Colbert's take on it, is HILARIOUS! Link here.
"Our Muppet masters, have been turning Children into alphabet reciting, snuffalupagus hallucinating, elmo ticklers."

"I would much rather my children watch opinion chicken Glenn Beak squawk about how President Barack Opossum wants to euthanize Big Bird and legalize Burt-Ernie marriage."
- LOL!!!

Laura Linnie & Paul Giamatti, Tour de Force

HBO ran all seven episodes of the 2008 series John Adams on the Fourth of July weekend, and Dr. Desert Flower DVR'ed them all. I was skeptical, since I best remembered Adams for the Alien & Sedition Acts, and losing his 2nd term in a three way race against Jefferson & Burr where Adams got 20% of the electoral college and Jefferson & Burr split (evenly) the other 80% - a rather poor showing for a sitting president.

I had no idea of what an angry, spiteful, unpleasant ancient man he became as he ungracefully aged to finally die at 90. 90, in the 1800s, is like 120 or 130 today. I am very glad I was not one of his sons. A great patriot, a remarkable thinker and dedicated man, yes. But oh so unpleasant! How Abigail Adams ever put up with him I Do Not Know. Laura Linney as Abigail gave a powerful performance. Giamatti, man, can he act. Portraying a couple in their late 30s, up though their 80s, in all their beauty & ugliness, strengths & weaknesses, courage & fears. I found myself captivated, watching it - the fact that I threw out my knee on Tuesday night added to be captivity perhaps =)

...but HBO did a fine job on the mini-series. They REALLY made each historical character LOOK like the characters we have on US currency, that are sculpted and painted in Washington DC, and Mt.Vernon, and Independence Hall in Philadelphia, and elsewhere. Yellow fever, small pox, drinking alcohol with every meal (to avoid dysentery), treaties with the French & British... so many nuances I was not fully aware of the Impact they had on everyday life and the course of human events at the time. It's well worth a watch if you've not seen it.

"Effective Vice President" ??

Talk of the Nation on NPR this afternoon, has Ken Rudin saying "Vice President Cheney was the most effective Vice President of all time". ??? WTF?

Yes, if by "effective", you mean
- effective in isolating American Internationally and squandering the good will universally extended to us on September 12th 2001.

- effective in getting no bid contracts for his cronies at Haliburton / KBR, including the building of defective showers that have killed dozens of US service men in Iraq.

- effective in revealing the names of covert CIA agents

- effective in lowering the tone of discourse in American Politics by telling Senator Leahy to go f*ck himself" on the Senate floor

- effective in being a massive hypocrite by participating in a party that denies equal rights to gay couples when his own daughter is in a committed lesbian relationship in which she just had a daughter with her "partner". I guess when you're really really rich and politically connected, it's fine to not have any rights in a relationship and tell others what they can do in their bed rooms and with their uteruses (uterii?).

Yes Ken, Cheney was very effective. Katrina was an effective Hurricane. Bush was an effective idiot & decider. The Black Plague was an effective population limiter for Europe. Small Pox was an effective gift to the indigenous peoples of the Americas from their new European friends. John Rutsey was an effective first album drummer for Rush.

Speak English! It's Umerika!

You're in America, and here, we ALL speak English! 

Well...  after small pox, plague, tuberculosis, cholera, alcohol, and genocide were introduced... now "you speak English!" in Umerika.

Interestingly, in the bottom of this picture, you can see the Mayan peninsula in SE Mexico.  Our chauffeur who drove us in a big black Suburban from the Cancun airport to the Excellence Playa Mujeres resort (2 weeks ago yesterday) said to us: "The name of the city, is actually Bonita Waurez, not 'Cancun'. 'Cancun' is a Mayan name, meaning 'snake nest'.  The Mayans used to warn people, to look out for snake nests, and the name stuck, but in Spanish, the name of the city is actually 'Bonito Juarez' " (link here) [“olla de serpientes” (kaan kun)]. 

To My Dear Republican Friends...

Every time I hear a Republican / Libertarian / Tea Bagger / Blogger / Conservative / Pox News 'analyst' / Pundit say that The Daily Show is partisan and liberal, they need to watch this clip:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-january-18-2010/mass-backwards

[link here, if the embedded video does not work]
And after watching the video, I recommend some mango chutney with their crow, as they Shut Up.
"John Lennon's favorite Beetle, is Mickey Dolenz"
"Curt schilling is a Yankees fan"
"Coakley believes Larry Bird, is a Sesame Street Character"
"Coakley went into the bar at Cheers, and didn't know anybody's name" "Hey, Jerome!"

TDS writers and Jon Stewart are equal opportunity satirists, pointing out stupidity and irony amusingly whenever possible. The monumental stupidity and incompetence of the Bush administration masked the lingering malaise that is the Democratic party from 2000 to 2008. Now, the Democrats are once again proving their inability to win, lead, or execute governance efficiently.

"The reason it will die.... if Coakley loses, Democrats will only have an 18 vote majority in the Senate, which is more than George W Bush Ever Had in the Senate when he did whatever the f#ck he wanted to do. In fact, the Democrats have a greater majority than Republicans have had since 1923."

"See, it's not that the Democrats are playing checkers and the Republicans are playing chess. The Republicans are playing chess and the Democrats are in the nurse's office because once again they glued their balls to their thighs."

"It's not your fault Democratic leadership. No one should have raised the bar of expectations for you. We should just leave the bar on the ground. Wait for you to trip."

Not News - 11Jan10

It is not news that FaceBooker and resigned ex-Governor Sarah Palin joined Pox News. It IS surprising she is not a peroxide blond like her new colleagues, or that anything she says or thinks or comments on could be called "news".

It's not news that Mark McGwire finally admitted he used steroids while playing MLB. It IS surprising he's not had a heart attack, or needed a liver or kidney transplant yet.

It's not news that Ford's market share rose last year. It IS surprising that GM still exists, at all.

Must be a very slow news Monday.

Palin 2012, I sure hope so

Whether it is Palin, or Beck, or some other combination of clueless demagogues who cling to their fears, tax-cuts, mis-information, quick-creationism, fundamentalism, or other "quaint" beliefs and biases whose diminishing influence in a modern, informed and fact-based America continues to make them More and More irrelevant, I am looking forward to the most vacuous ticket possible. Hockey moms who desert their elected offices, victimized Mormons who 'just ask questions', former MA governors whose investment capital firms gut American business and send jobs over seas... the more vocal and charismatic and "lovable" by their hard-core primary voter Republican voter base, the better!

These popularly hyped-up dim-wits futile attempts to win over the VAST MAJORITY of the uncommitted middle of America, the independents, will fail miserably. Sure, thousands of tea-baggers will gather, and blog, and comment on Pox news, and gnash their teeth, and try to rally others, but it will not get the vast majority of Americans interested in voting for ideological nut-jobs. This MIGHT result in Splintering of the Republicans into the "Conservative Party" and the remaining moderates, but that would be out of character for voting base who is well versed at marching lock-step with what their idolized leaders tell them to do.

Breaking the plurality of the American corporate 2 party system would be the Best Thing to happen to the democratic process since the 4 way split of 1824! Let the fringe 20% further become a separatist and regional party, and more strongly embody the side-show in which they continue to increasingly perform. All other major Democracies in the world do not engage in a 2 party system, just the corporately driven Americans embrace it.

Palin or other equally fringe personalities have no more chance of winning national office in the US as Le Pen did in France, even if they run 5 times (like JM Le Pen has). I'm looking forward to participating in a multi-party democracy in the future.

AZ & SC Compete For Most Willfully Ignorant

Like the kid in Sixth Sense who said "I see dead people" ...well, here in Arizona, "I see stupid and scared people". Man, I thought South Carolina was bad when I lived there with their secessionist, bigoted, heritage-of-hatred, South will rise again, segregated "Christian" churches, we-don't-need-you-damn-Yankees-here, ignorant perspectives. But here in Arizona, they're trying really hard to surpass South Carolina in the really dumb bills being passed in the State Assembly.

Today, the Arizona Legislature passed a bill (link here) that "require U.S. presidential candidates who want to appear on the ballot in Arizona to submit documents proving they meet the constitutional requirements to be president." How completely idiotic! Hey, Republicans (it passed on a party line vote), the birth certificate provided IS REAL, you willfully ignorant anachronisms! (links here [Snopes no less], here, here, and here). Yeah, but these are the same morons who deny climate change because the East Coast had alot of snow this year. Does Pox News have a coded "zombie signal" embedded in it's HD feed, that is hypnotizing it's viewers perhaps?

I agree with Phoenix Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, who said 'the bill is one of several measures that are making Arizona "the laughing stock of the nation."'