Anti-Feminism

nakednerd brought this rant to my attention in his post. It is a misogynistic and homophobic 20 page rant against women and feminism. It is actually like listening to a very harsh stand-up comic.

Link to the full text in html, with more easy on the eyes formatting

In pdf form if you want for your palm or whatever.

A history of Cerebus and Dave Sim (apparnetly Cerebus is a 300 volume piece of comic book history).

Lena, you should repost this in the feminism forum and see what their reactions would be.

Buxon

So, the National Review calls Bush scary because he uses Nixonian politics. Now Salon.com has John Dean, fromer White House counsel to Nixon, calling Bush scarier than Nixon. My favorite line comes early, "Nixon only abused executive privilege (the power of a president to withhold information from his constitutional co-equals) after Watergate, while Bush and Cheney have sought to abuse the privilege from the outset." I wonder how it feels to be attacked from all sides of the political spectrum...

Amusingly timed, John Waters said that John Whitaker, undersecretary of the interior to Nixon, is his uncle in the book I've just finished, Shock Value.

Here I am: Stuck in the middle with you

From Salon.com: Nader said his campaign will help Democrats by opening a "second front" against Bush.

*sigh*

Its election years like these that I really need to buy stock in Goldschlager and Smirnoff.

Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right

John Kerry was giving a speech today at some university. CNN cut in for his speech on oil and energy. He said, in two consecutive sentences, "drilling is not the answer. I will not allow soldiers to be captured and tortured because of our oil dependence on my watch." Or something to that effect. No transitional sentence, making the second part a non sequitar. He further goes on to explain that he will create 500,000 jobs in the U.S. by requiring that 20% (ooo, 20% is alot) of our energy will not depend on oil by the year 2020. *sigh* We all know that more people working toward a single goal will always decrease the research and development time, right? *crickets chirping* Well, the liberal arts students tend to think so, given the whole 100,000 monkeys chained to keyboard mentality.

Bush, in the recent annual dinner joked with the press about his ability to make mistakes. He started looking for something and made the comment, "those weapons of mass destruction. They have to be somewhere around here." Now, I find this to be in extremely poor taste, and thus extremely hilarious. NRO and the rest of the conservatives can convince themselves otherwise, as in the recent NRO article which states: "President Bush was mocking himself and his current political predicament regarding WMDs, and the joke works because he clearly believes he's doing the right thing." *sigh*

If only a somebody who doesn't belong to either party, and believes that big government is bad would come along. I'd be so much happier.

You know...

The conservatives almost had me believing that the conservative problem with gay marriage was federalism.

Maggie Gallagher writes:
"The problem, both legally and politically, with the Hatch language is that is changes the topic from marriage to federalism."

So, its not federalism thats the problem, it IS that gay marriage should be banned. And that gay marriage should not have any constitutionally-written rights.

The Hatch language is:

Civil marriage shall be defined in each state by the legislature or the citizens thereof. Nothing in this Constitution shall be construed to require that marriage or its benefits be extended to any union other than that of a man and a woman.

as opposed to the conservative endorsed:

Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.

One has it at a federal level, while the other has it at a state level. Part of the problem is the taxes that occur at the federal level will still be higher for civil unions than married couples. And, we still need to eliminate these bigots.

And she concludes: "Which may be why Sen. Hatch made it clear last week that he endorses the original FMA."

(note: some conservatives have themselves convinced that marriage is only to create corporations. If thats true, then "There are many other problems with the Hatch language...the Hatch language asserts rather forcefully that marriage is a creature of government" would be a completely misguided and false statement. But, it is one that many conservatives whole-heartedly agree.

So, let me just say YAY FOR BIGOTRY!!!

No, Bush never abuses the rules *whistles*

The Democrats refuse to let the Senate recess until Bush promises no more temporary judiciary replacements

Add that to the list of Bush abusing the rules of power. I'm sure the Constitution was written so that the President could circumvent the federal process and the senate. They approved 173 out of 179. Yeah, the democrats are being picky...And, I believe that Richard Simmons would make a good judge too.

Ultraviolence in rapid pacing

Guess what's the latest on Stileproject?

You guessed it, the animated version of The Passion of the Christ.

Its really hilarious.

Did I mention it was set to the MGM tune of Liberace's salsa-cocktail classic Aruba Liberace from When the Boys Meet the Girls? Well it is.

Mistaken Conservatives

L has this link as proof of the jets they uncovered in Iraq as evidence of WMD. It did also say that "in many cases, had their wings removed." Where did the wings go?

Here's some facts refuting this as a WMD:

1. The plane currently has no wings.

2. The plane in the picture is "an advanced reconnaissance version" which means it wasn't meant for combat.

3. It is a Mig-25 Foxbat. The fact is that without its wings, the plane is not, let me repeat NOT a WMD. Why, do you ask? Well, besides the obvious fact that it cannot fly.

Here's one site's analysis of the Foxbat: "single-seat reconnaissance aircraft with limited precision bombing capability."

Here's another site's analysis of the Foxbat's weaponry:

WEAPONS

The aircraft is armed with four R-40 (Nato codename AA-6 Acrid) air-to-air missiles equipped with infrared and radar homing heads. The range of these missiles is 2-60km. The missiles are suspended from four underwing pylons. It may also be fitted with two R-40 and four R-60 (AA-8 Aphid), or two R-23 (AA-Apex) and four R-73 (AA-11 Archer). The MiG-25 is not fitted with a gun.

WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION MY ASS!!!!!!!!!

Without the wings, the plane is not a threat. Once the missiles and wings are unearthed, then AND ONLY THEN will I believe that WMDs were discovered with respect to this plane's unearthing.

However, if it was a Mig-23 or a Mig-27, then it would be a WMD, since those are weapons capable of dogfighting and doing damage.

Here's a not-so-stupid site easily found on the internet. It only shows the exhumation of the same aicraft, but says that the Mig-25 was indeed used in combat. However, given that it can fire 4 or 6 missles at most, I wouldn't say it would be an efficient jet to take up. But, still, this one DIDN'T HAVE ANY WINGS!! I'm sure that, like a car, buying wings might be cheaper than buying whole new planes.

(P.S. Sand is not good for engines, if I remember correctly. So, in addition to the aforementioned problems, sand is terrible)

IN ADDITION TO THIS:
White House documents say "nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons" is the definition of Weapons of Mass Destruction, with some variations thereof (capable of mass destruction, mass killings, injuries, etc). Sorry, but the missiles which the MIg-25 is capable of carrying is only coventional missile warheads, and not nuclear warheads. This adds to the fact that THIS IS NOT A WEAPON OF MASS DESTRUCTION. A weapon of plane destruction, maybe, but not mass.

To appease the right

Here's something I agree with:

The EU is going to lift the embargo and open trade with China. NRO finds this a bad idea. As do I.

Let me just say *shudder*.

China scares me.

Bushisms

"Had I known that the enemy was going to use airplanes to strike America, to attack us, I would have used every resource, every asset, every power of this government to protect the American people."

It seems that even conservatives are turning against Bush. National Review had an article calling Bush Nixonian (actually in danger of becoming Nixonian) because of his political methods. The articles reviews the latest evidence of Bush withholding Medicare budget information from the voting Senators and Representatives, and claims it to be, well, sucky. I agree with him. I want an honest president, and that is my main problem with Bush. He's not honest, he's slippery and slimy, and he hasn't done much good (especially the Patriot Act :-P).

Back to Politics, with an emphasis on whining

The Arabs are now at Civil War soldier age of 14. Though, in another report (from AP), The boy was reported as age 16, though has the intelligence of a 12-year old. So, I had an online conversation which ended with a comment somewhere along the lines of, Americans used to use 14 year olds in the civil war, and that was OK. But, apparently the 11-year old doing the suicide bombing was wrong. So, a line was drawn, but where it was. So, the Arabs are still using kids, but its 14 year olds. Where do you draw the line? And, don't cop out by saying that nobody should be suicide bombing because that is way besides the point (though it is a point I agree with).

You have to love the woods

Two states
Two judgements
Two laughs

Georgia has decided to take another right away from women. In a unanimous vote, the Georgia house decided to add piercing on a list of what can not be done to female genetalia. No more hood piercings allowed for you women, unless you want to go to jail for 2-20 years. The word unanimous means even the democrats voted for this too, but, then again, this is Georgia, where liberals are conservative and conservatives are psychotic.

Oregon has become one of the toughest states to get married in. You just have to know which county you're in. Yes, in a recent fit of fairness, Benton County in Oregon has decided to stop issuing ALL MARRIAGE LICENSES. On Monday, they were going to start issuing gay marriage licenses, but, due to the lawsuits everywhere, they decided to go the other way and stop issuing them altogether. As one conservative has recently been telling me, marriage is not a right. This also makes Oregon the most diversified state as they also have Multnomah County issuing gay and straight licenses as well. This just adds more victims to those hurt by gay marriages.

Cut off the head, and...

The Hamas sect has already declared another leader. This news comes as completely entertaining to me, as, while I didn't feel any sympathy for the original Sheikh, this is extremely reminiscent of "you take an eye for an eye and the whole world goes blind." The new leader apparently is more aggressive than the last one (if that is imaginable), and has vowed revenge against the Zionist occupation.

In the meantime, Israel has vowed to keep killing the Hamas leadership. But, the best part, is that the Hamas has decided that the United States helped in this attack (and with the Republican response, it wouldn't really surprise me). They have hinted that they might attack the US, so thanks Israel. *roll eyes*

Why can't they just do some mass killings of each other and get it over with, instead of these wimpy suicide bombings and missile assaninations (though from a helicopter is pretty hilarious)? It'd probably be more humane.

In related news, the death toll in Madrid has been lowered from 202 to 190. Apparently 13 body bags containing parts thought to belong to individuals really belonged to other bodies or to victims who lost limbs. For some reason I can't help but imagine the Very Bad Things scenario where they're sorting out the body parts ("We have a torso over here!").

I ain't got no body

For all of you gore-hounds out there:

An image of Shiekh Ahmed Yassin in the morgue

Warning: Explicit content. May churn stomachs.

[ed's note (05-18-04): I still think this is one of my best subject lines ever]

Bush Bashing

Salon.com reports on an interview set to air on 60 Minutes tonight (or next Sunday).

Richard A. Clarke, who also wrote a book set to be released on Monday, has commented that Bush has done a terrible job with terrorism. He was a counterterrorism coordinator.

"He said he wrote to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice on Jan. 24, 2001, asking 'urgently' for a Cabinet-level meeting 'to deal with the impending al-Qaida attack.'"

"'Now he never said, "Make it up." But the entire conversation left me in absolutely no doubt that George Bush wanted me to come back with a report that said, "Iraq did this,"' said Clarke, who told the president that U.S. intelligence agencies had never found a connection between Iraq and al-Qaida.

'He came back at me and said, "Iraq! Saddam! Find out if there's a connection," and in a very intimidating way,' Clarke said."

In the article, CBS claims to have found two supporters of this conversation.

"'Bin Laden had been saying for years, "America wants to invade an Arab country and occupy it, an oil-rich Arab country." This is part of his propaganda,' Clarke said. 'So what did we do after 9/11? We invade ... and occupy an oil-rich Arab country, which was doing nothing to threaten us.'

Slapping Down the Morons

So, while pointing out obvious fallacies in some of L's readers arguments in This post, I came upon a revelation which I find quite amusing.

Some twit commented:
LOTR is about good vs. evil, it's so clear. Then the 2nd pic was The Two Towers. How prophetic is that?

Liberals can't claim LOTR because it's a WAR movie, it's a movie where you have to go to WAR in order to save the world.

So, let's see here...parallels. Hrm. The Two Towers belong to the bad guys. The people attacking the two towers are the good guys. The people attacking the two towers (aka the good guys) are sacrificing their own men, and not manufacturing weapons of mass destruction. The people in the towers are making weapons of mass destruction (the US makes missiles and other sorts of massive weaponry), and are the bad guys. They also attack the good guys on the good guys' turf. And, how can I forget, just as Sauron needed the trees to make his army of Orcs, the US needs oil from the Middle East (including Iraq) to manufacture and use our weaponry.

If the book was really prophetic, the US will crumble under the attack waged by the Iraqis.

I'm sure this has been thought of before, but I don't remember reading it elsewhere. If somebody can come across an article which might have stuck in the back of my mind, I'd gladly give over claim to this idea, but I think I did it on my own.

OKOK, so if the Americans are really the good guys, and LOTR was really a parallel (nevermind that The Two Towers belonged to the enemy [nitwit]):

The good guys declared war to save the world AFTER being repeatedly attacked on their own turf. Now, I can see attacking Al-Qaeda for this...but I haven't seen any Iraqi missiles flying over our heads in the good ol' U S of A.

Just some points to ponder.

A biased opinion on a biased opinion on a biased opinion

Jeez, one could get lost in this title.

National Review has reported that BuzzCharts has released a Misery Chart index again. For those of you who don't know, the misery index is the chart which measures the unemployment rate with the inflation rate.



NRO has decided that because Dubya's Misery index is 7.6, which is 71% of Old Bush's Misery index, he can't be all that bad. Its a mere 71%. They cite Clinton's first term index of 8.8 as evidence of this.

Now, let's look at this clearly. Old Bush had a misery index of 10.7. WWII wasn't that bad with a 9.5. The Clinton economy had to reverse what Old Bush did, and so got the 8.8 was on its way to a 6.8 for his second term. Which was an average. Bush was handed less than a 6.8 misery index in the economy, and what happens? In less than four years, he brings us back to a 7.6, a .8 jump. Almost halfway back to the difference between Clinton's first and second terms.

NRO says that the economy is picking back up. If that's so, why are people all around still worried about their job security? Why are people still getting laid off and working at gas stations because there aren't many place to go?

I'm waiting to see what would happen if he did win again...

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And, in other National Review news,

John Derbyshire is (not-jokingly it seems) calling for an end to Congress. YAY for giving the states no voice...oh...wait.

However, I do want to make Government smaller (like it was before the Depression), but...alas. To do that would take a miracle and an abolishment of the left-wingers as well as the right. The left want all sorts of crappy programs for the poor. The right are creating all sorts of expensive programs for the poor (Medicare, No Child Left Behind, etc). Where are all the people who want the government to back the fuck off?? That's what I want to know.

Verified Vindication

From Salon.com:

Poland pulls its troops out of Iraq

Quote from Polish President:

"Naturally, one may protest the reasons for the war action in Iraq. I personally think that today, Iraq without Saddam Hussein is a truly better Iraq than with Saddam Hussein," Kwasniewski told the European reporters.

"But naturally I also feel uncomfortable due to the fact that we were misled with the information on weapons of mass destruction," he said, according to a transcript released by the presidential press office.


Well, at least the Americans weren't the only ones lied to.

(OK, my conscience is telling me to say that Poland is not pulling out until early 2005...but thats still early in terms of the Bush reconstruction plan)

Interesting

Stolen from upsidedownblue. Al Qaeda supports Bush. Though, I think this might be a hoax or something. I found the back-handed remarks intensely hilarious.

"not possible to find a leader 'more foolish than you (Bush), who deals with matters by force rather than with wisdom.'"

"Democrats have the cunning to embellish blasphemy and present it to the Arab and Muslim nation as civilization."

If this is a true Al Qaeda statement, I find it hilarious. If it is the Democrats trying to get somebody to support Bush, it is still quite hilarious.

America: Where Quick Solutions Are Always Favored

nakednerd recently posted on Salon's article of teenagers and other young people undergoing gastric bypass surgery to lose weight. Let me just say, "ugh." I have had occasional thoughts about undergoing the knife, but it is the easy way out. If you don't do it yourself, your chance of relapsing is quite high, except in the extreme case of gastric bypass. Gastric bypass, to me, is the shortcut, and the type of thing which Requiem for a Dream warns us about.

The scary thing is despite all of the complications that such surgery can have in both short and long term effects, the doctor insists that nobody has wished that the surgery could be reversed. I find this hard to believe or stomach, but then I don't. The effects include malnutrition, loss of freedom regarding meals, etc.

I agree with Phil, the parents are partially to blame. They are the ones supplying the snacks and the food and not stopping the kids from eating what they do. These are kids who are sedentry and eat 9 pieces of pizza in a sitting on top of snacking and other sorts of things. I'm probably generalizing, but they've probably never touched a piece of fruit in their life. Or, if they have, its been in the form of sugared whatever (see sugared strawberries and raisinets).

But, then, when a girl is having small heart attacks in middle school, it is probably for her health. I just think that I would rather do it myself, and actually have the willpower to stay with it (as I am off and on for the winter of my own attempts).

A.B.B.

Yet another reason to hate Bush and his administration:

Bush's administration lied about cost estimates regarding Medicare. Get rid of the liars!!!

(new item thanks to nakednerd)

Humor

So, I've been looking at The Every Three Weekly online lately. It seems to have improved since last year. The magazine isn't nearly as awesome as it was when it first started. It used to be really quite crude and offensive, just the way we like things. My favorite issues have always been March 2000, which had the Michiguama team up with the Native Americans to make the Union a casino, and January 2000 which had Courtney Cantor's father suing lettuce and Diet Coke. Also, December 1999 has the best music review ever.

They also don't have the issues before February or March's issue for this year yet. But, it is still a cool magazine.

And, Janet Jackson's breast should get the Presidency. It'd probably do a better job than Bush.

Fuck. Hell Has Frozen Over

I am on the side of the Christians.

maryshelley alerted me to this news article. In Maine, the Christian Civil League is planning on doing a mass outing of all political figures. The main difference is the focus. I want to focus on those who want to restrict marriage to being exclusively a man and a woman. They want to focus on those who will vote against such measures. But, still, I find it very amusing, and I say "OUT EVERYBODY!!!"

Top O' The News

sukk told the fact that California has halted San Francisco's issuing of gay marriage. Salon's article confirms the fact.

Perhaps this is just speculation, but while this seems a step in the wrong direction, it ultimately is a step in the right direction. To be issuing illegal marriage licenses is actually criminal, no matter how much I agree with the idea of gay marriage. Between Massachusetts and SF, the gay marriage debate has been brought to the forefront of news and media (despite the importance of other issues which have been almost forgotten), so now gays have to win over the minds and/or sense of decency (if they have any) of the bigotted right. And, a prolonged illegal protest has never been the way to win over law-abiding self-claimed moralistic people.

But, I still would very much like to join in the candlelight march in San Francisco tonight over the ruling. A decent sign saying that a decent segment of the population of at least that city is for gay marriage. And, anybody in the area - gay or straight, married, engaged, dating, or single - who is for the legalization of gays to get married should join in and let the number grow, because it is the size that counts.

Maybe it's just that I am noticing more, or that I think that this is actually an acomplishable task, but I think that this type of march for rights is very good for the nation. Its been awhile since I've seen more than just causeheads actually care about the debate and say something more than just ridicule about the protesters. But, then again, I was at UofM, home of the causehead.

*God, I'm sounding like Hunter S. Thompson in his reminiscent moments in Fear and Loathing. Somebody shoot me*

And, despite the reassurance by Glenn A Fine that the Patriot Act has no abuses, even reported, I have found some interesting information. In September, The Daily Texan listed a bunch of cases where the Patriot Act has been invoked in items not even remotely related to terrorism, including the taking down of a methamphetamine lab. And, in November, a strip club owner may have been on the wrong end of the Patriot Act's stick. With no qualms from the Justice Department. I don't consider meth to be a great benefit to society, but bending the act to construe it as a chemical of mass destruction is a bit far fetched. And, I don't approve of said measures being used.

Down with the Patriot Act.

Creeped Out

So, I'm reading through the Patriot Act now. I find it very amusing that New York City has passed a resolution against the Patriot Act, becoming the 247th community in the United States to go against it.

EPIC (Electronic Privacy Information Center) has a page dedicated to its outline of the Patriot Act, its consequences, and it has the full text of the Patriot Act. Now, I'm not a lawyer, so some of the wording is a bit difficult and circular, but reading that first outline is scary enough to me. Even if you do take out all of the spin that EPIC puts on the page.

A.B.B.

News

And, in actual news, Bush has lost his gay backers (thanks to nakednerd). The Austin 12 has decided to back out of Bush promotion due to his support of the FMA.

I do think that the outing of every gay Republican and their relatives would be very appropriate in this case. Let's go malicious.

Cinematic Belief

I think I'll add a bit more on faith and such, especially with regards to cinematic influence and recent events.

I was raised a Catholic and went to Catechism through First Communion. Then, due to my status as an outsider, I decided that I didn't want to go to Catechism anymore. Why torture yourself by attempting to learn about stuff you can barely comprehend at that age anyways. It seems like indoctrination and mind control to me.

So, I became an atheist pretty early on. It was when I was 16 that I first did a really big question of my lack of faith, when I saw The Last Temptation of Christ. The movie put the stories I had heard about in Catechism into a context which I could deal with and actually think about believing. It's whole idea was that Christ was fallible, and he was actually a human being with human emotions and human problems. He struggled with them, and he dealt with them. The whole "He could be a nutjob" scenario may have been addressed (I don't really remember), but I finished the movie thinking that maybe religion is actually a decent thing. Maybe I could be religious.

This, to me, is the mark of a great movie. Something that challenges your beliefs, whether you're an atheist or a Catholic, as it was (and still is) a controversial film from the Christian religions.

I basically am still atheistic, with more of a sense of some sort of universal force. A Karma-like force that drives the universe and keeps it from destroying itself.

I saw The Passion of the Christ last night, and it reinforced my religious beliefs more than anything else in the past has. It made me despise Catholicism, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and any other sort of religion with blind faith substituting for logic. It sends these people to do horrible things to other people in the name of some silly belief that may or may not be true.

And, perhaps I do need to believe in something. Maybe I should believe that there is somebody/something looking over us. And, perhaps that is what this Karma-like force is, a religion of my own sort. One that isn't fully attached to anything, but definitely has some holistic value to it.

FMA News

Dan also alerted me to a full-page ad printed in the Outlook of Sunday's Free Press. It was "paid for by FRCAction other citizens concerned for the preservation of marriage." Also, visit the site http://www.formarriage.org/ for more info.

The letter states:
"Dear Mister President:

"We are Deeply Grateful
"We deeply appreciate your long-standing and deep-seated commitment to the preservation of the family. We especially thank you for the decision you announced to support and work for the passage of the Federal Marriage Amendment, as introduced in both Houses of COngress.
"We can think of no more crucial issue for our nation than the preservation of the institution of marriage. As you have repeatedly pointed out, it is threatened today by courts which have acted contrary to the Constitution, making rather than interpreting the law.

"We Applaud Your Courage
"There have been times in our history when presidents have been caled upon to make difficult decisions to protect the balance of power in our government.Abraham Lincoln did this when he refused to recogize the Constitutional precedent of the Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision. We think you are making just suck a stand in opposing what we view as runaway courts.
"Thank you, sir, for standing wih the people and for doing what is right.

"We Pledge to You
"We will do everything in our power to inform and to educate our constituents about the importance and urgency of this issue both for the preservation of the family in America as well as the right ordering of our government. We will speak on behalf of and to our communities, encouraging their fullest participation in what must be a great national debate to preserve both the sanctity of marriage and our representative form of government.

"May God bless you as you carry out your great responsibilities"

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Yes, Bush is being compared to Abraham Lincoln. The NATIONAL banning of gay marriage is actually being compared to the freeing of slaves. *sigh and ugh*

And it has been signed by many people (alot of religious groups and groups with the word "family" in it), including our favorite asshole, Jerry Falwell.

Fucking conservatives.