Another Bloomie Boner

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking - Hey, dude! Right now, we’ve got the president doing the exact same thing about Iran as he did a few years back about Iraq. And the press is just as credulous (or complicit) as before. The Democrats have taken over the House and Senate yet remain as feckless as ever, the Senate unable to even allow themselves to debate whether or not they think Bush has his head completely up his own ass. But you keep talking about the diminutive mayor of New York City. What’s up with that?

Good question, loyal DoGger. I’m not entirely sure what it is, but I think it might be that Bush, a complete douchebag to be sure, is pretty much the same as always - the same boring douchebaggery day after day. But Bloomberg finds new and exciting ways to tell us that we’re little more than his menial subjects to be taxed, jailed, and told to eat cake. And while Bush will always have a base of complete morons who have no problem with sending wave after wave of soldiers to their death and disfigurement, Bloomberg is taking the side of issues that literally no one can support - he’s come out as pro-child frostbite, anti-electricity for the plebs, anti-anyone’s opinion, and now best of all, he’s taking a pro-parking ticket during snowstorms stance. How can you beat that?

As drivers dug themselves out from Wednesday’s modest but messy snowstorm, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg found himself on the defensive over the city’s decision not to suspend alternate-side parking rules. That move had residents complaining that their cars were ticketed after plows buried them in snow.

The mayor was at times curt, testy and defensive as he answered questions from reporters at a Sanitation Department garage in Woodside, Queens, yesterday, even suggesting that New Yorkers stop “griping” about the situation.

Stop your yappin’, you whining sissies! I didn’t hear my driver, butler or handmaids complaining when I asked them to take the limo out of the garage! Geez!

“It wasn’t like you had a couple of feet of snow, where you really couldn’t physically move your car,” he said. “You had to put on galoshes and go out there and move it.”

Galoshes? Does he mean rubbers? Anyway, Hizzoner is right that there were only a few inches of snow. What he neglects to mention is that it was hard as a fucking rock and completely unmeltable. People were out there with pickaxes trying to chip it away like Michelangelo working on David. And I’d like Mayor B to tell the people who were trapped on planes for ten hours that the storm was a tiny little nothing of a storm. There are still folks camped out in the airport.

But hey - if you don’t have a private jet, consider yourself lucky I let you sleep on the floor.

Federal Prosecutor Bob Loblaw

I think it’s important that you read today’s column by my boy, Joe Conason. It’s a story we’ve heard a little about here and there, but I guess reading it in 1000 word column format really clicked it home. It’s about the recent spate of federal prosecutor firings by the Bush administration.

You see, it’s up to the US Attorneys to monitor politicians. And because of that fact, we have, in our nation’s history, gone out of our way to see that our prosecutors are as non-partisan as is possible. Additionally, if there was a vacancy, it used to be that local judges would appoint the successor. All of which was to prevent any politically motivated shenanigans (i.e. – you get in trouble, you can’t just fire your prosecutor).

Secretly, quietly (and unbeknownst to even himself) Senator Arlen Spector slipped a tiny amendment into the Patriot Act -- that sweet ol’ Patriot Act again -- that allows the president to fill vacancies in the US Attorney’s Office. Permanent appointments with no oversight. Ring a little fascist to you? Me too.

So as you might expect, Bush has gone around firing prosecutors left and right - men and women with important roles such as prosecuting the easily bribed Representative Duke Cunningham. Bush then filled the vacancies with obsequious hacks and political cronies.

You see, Bush has his fingers in all the pies, it’s just these days he has to do it a little more quietly. I think it’s horrifying that still he’s trying to tighten his grip and squash out all signs of life in our representative democracy. Congress is trying to step in and bring some oversight back to at least this one issue, but good God! It’s positively chilling the ways that Bush keeps coming up with to try to turn our country into his own personal dictatorship.

Do Not Question the Great and Powerful Bloomberg

We’re still talking about how he kicked the kids off the busses and has been making them freeze their asses off waiting for a ride in the sub-zero temperatures this past fortnight. You know how most politicians don’t say what they really think? Not Mikey; he plops his gigantic cantaloupes right out on the table.

A visibly angry Bloomberg blasted Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum and City Council members when asked about the critics' stance that the cost-saving overhaul is a flop.

"You know, you're quoting people who have no experience in doing anything, so I don't quite know how to answer it," he said.

As opposed to himself who had, how much experience in public service when he ran for mayor? Oh… Well, he had a fuckload of money anyway. This is America and that’s all that matters.

In any case, that quote? Dismissing critics as know-nothing losers? He may say he’s not running for president, but that sure sounds like presidential material to me.

Stop It

I don't usually pay attention to stories like the so-called Astro-nut because it's basically the same thing as the Runaway Bride or even the latest Missing White Girl - a media frenzy surrounding an ultimately meaningless story. A happenstance that has no effect on anyone's life but those involved in the events at hand. But somehow this one's different. And you know what? I don't think it's funny.

There are crazy people all over the place; they come in all shapes and sizes. But this one? She graduated from the Naval Academy. She served in the Navy before eventually moving up to NASA and actually went into fucking space! She's no wackjob from Oklahoma City. She worked really hard -- harder than you or I ever have -- to achieve her dreams, and now she's thrown them away over some guy she liked. She's been vetted by the United States' foremost psychologists and passed. She's been through more stressful experiences than any of us could imagine. She accepted these challenges and she succeeded. Then, she went to the trouble of putting on a diaper so she wouldn't have to stop on a 900 mile trip to go confront the competition for her man. That is a long time to reconsider what you're doing and yet nothing stopped her. It's a long fall from being mentally stable enough to be on the Space Shuttle to willingly and consciously discarding your life's ambitions, husband and children in order to attack some floozy in Florida. Don't you think that's enough punishment?

I read that she lost three of her closest friends when the Space Shuttle Columbia was destroyed. Maybe that was it. Maybe not. But clearly something happened to her to cause her to lose her way. And frankly, I think she deserves the benefit of our sympathy. She dedicated her life in service to our country and now she has nothing. How about we "honor the troops" in her case as much as we would some poor soul who's come back from Iraq lost and alone and permanently damaged.

From My Cold Dead Hands

New York, New York, it’s a hell of a town.
The Bronx is up and the Battery’s down.
If you want to do anything remotely fun at any time, go fuck yourself and die, we have a million idiot tourists dying to get into the Disney Store so we can do without you, you insignificant little maggot.
It’s a hell of a town!

Is that how that old tune went? I can’t quite remember… Maybe it’s how our local legislators think it went. First it was the porn charm of old Times Square. Then it was our smokes. It was CBGB a few months ago, and countless other landmarks previous and many that are not long for this earth. And now this: Ban Proposed On Cell Phones, iPods In Crosswalk.

Read that again – banning the iPod. The one thing that brings a tiny amount of joy to my one mile walk to work in the morning, and again at night. All under the pretense of protecting us from ourselves. I guess some groovin’ motherfuckers have been jukin’ and jivin’ themselves smack into oncoming traffic. Jesus H. Christ! It’s getting so that it’s impossible to harm myself in this town!

In that spirit, our hotshot DoG insiders have uncovered the list of things they will protect us from next:

• Fresh Fruit Smoothies
  
• Camera Flashbulbs
  
• Papercuts
  
• Independent Filmmakers
  
• Furniture
  
• Cumulus Cloud Formations
  
• Krazy Glue (safe only if spelled with a ‘C’)
  
• Ketchup (see above)
  
• Windows Vista
  
• Mondays
  
• Cobblers
  
• Double Rainbows
  
• Tire Swings
  
• Comets
  
• Bright Eyes Lead Singer Connor Oberst
  
• Windmills
  
• Muffin Stumps
  
• Patchwork Quilts
  
• Sudoku
  
• Sierra Mist
  
• Ennui
  
• Sanskrit

On the other hand, an advance look shows an incomplete list of things they won’t be protecting us from:

• Getting evicted from your home to further enrich the megarich.
  
• Kids getting screwed out of school busing because there’s a buck to be saved.
  
• Con Ed
  
• The exponential growth in childhood asthma due to pollution in low income neighborhoods.
  
• The Stink From New Jersey.

Fuck it. Just take me to the Hippodrome… What? That too??

Kidsploitation

I’m going to be serious very briefly, and then I promise to get back to the ungay and astronauts in diapers. I’m not usually one to be too interested in the latest Missing White Girl frenzy. But this one has an added element of disgust that warrants attention, namely – Bill O’Reilly.

I’m sure you’ve heard about that poor kid Shawn Hornbeck who was kidnapped when he was 11 years old and held captive for four years. Now it’s come out that he was repeatedly sodomized – several times per day at first, and at least once a month after that. Horrible. What you might not be aware of -- because you’re smart and don’t watch cable news -- is that Mr. Bill O’Reilly had accused this now 15 year old boy of conspiring to stay with his kidnapper because it was “more fun” than going to school and doing chores at home.

O’REILLY: The situation here for this kid looks to me to be a lot more fun than what he had under his old parents. He didn't have to go to school. He could run around do what he wanted.

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN: Some kids like school.

O‘REILLY: I don't believe this kid today. I think when it all comes down, what's going to happen is there was an element here that this kid liked about his circumstance.

Yeah, real classy. But even after all these detailed abuse charges have come out, he has not apologized, retracted or in any way officially recanted his previous remarks about how much the boy enjoyed his four year stay in casa de torture. But really, even that’s not why I’m writing this post – that’s pretty much par for the course for Blustery Bill.

No, the reason I’m writing is because Bill O’Reilly is the keynote speaker next month at a National Center for Missing and Exploited Children $500/plate fundraiser. As recently as last week, the Center stands by their choice. Isn’t that just a little bizarre?

I think so. I doubt there’s much I can do, but since I have this tiny little platform from which to speak, I’m asking you to join me in contacting the Center and politely asking them why they haven’t asked O’Reilly either for an apology or for him to back out of their fundraiser. You can contact them here. I’m sure they relish the thought of making all that money, and I know they’d put it to good use. But they should think about how they’ll feel the morning after – after Bill O’s left the money on the nightstand and they have to get out of bed and look at themselves in the mirror.

Can’t Top It

I could sit here all day and never come up with a blurb about Rudi Giuliani’s presidential bid even half as eloquent as Wonkette’s.

Opera-Loving Twice-Divorced Manhattan Dandy Announces Candidacy

We love Rudy because he combines the can-do fascism of Mussolini with the personal morals of Caligula. America needs this, now!

What else is there to say?

Cured!

Good news, Jesus freaks and homophobes! Our favorite gay hypocrite and meth junkie is now all man, baby! Fathers, lock up your daughters!

One of four ministers who oversaw three weeks of intensive counseling for the Rev. Ted Haggard said the disgraced minister emerged convinced that he is "completely heterosexual."

There’s nothing like five men sitting around behind closed doors for days on end to quell the urge to suck dick. I’m completely confident that this will work perfectly, and they have cast those faggoty demons back to hell. Let’s face it, these heteroversions never fail.

Panic! At the T-Stop

No, I’m not gonna let it go so just put that thought out of your mind. Above is the clip of the Boston Terrorists in a press conference. One in which they refuse to answer any questions except those about hair. It’s magnificent. If they don’t get booked on The Daily Show, and possibly their own show, then there is truly no justice in the world.

More on the Terror by Toon Fiasco

I’ve said my piece on the subject, but I wanted to point out that my pal talented actor whom I’ve never met but totally admire, James Urbaniak -- that’s Dr. Venture to you -- is all over the Boston Aqua Teen Day of Terror on his blog. It’s worth a look-see…

Make the Homies Say Ho Make the Girlies Wanna Scream

With apologies to John Kerry, the Kennedys, my friends Llew and Ben, and the rest of the good people of Massachusetts, people in Boston are fucking idiots.

Those illuminated electronic devices were a promo for the cartoon series "Aqua Teen Hunger Force," but they got some attention the marketing agency probably wasn't counting on.

Police called out bomb squads after receiving four calls yesterday about the devices, at least 14 of which were planted at bridges and other public areas. Highways, bridges, subways and part of the Charles River were shut down before authorities declared the lights harmless.

OK, so you got Err from Aqua Teen Hunger Force giving you the finger on a Lite-Brite and you call in the bomb squad and start thowin’ dudes in jail? Apparently you do.

Peter Berdovsky, 29, was arrested on charges of placing a hoax device, a felony, and disorderly conduct, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley said. He was hired to distribute the devices, she said.

"We're not going to let this go without looking at the further roots of how this happened to cause the panic in this city," she said at a news conference last night.

"There's absolutely no place for [hoaxes] in a post-9/11 world," U.S. Homeland Security Department spokesman Russ Knocke said.

Panic? Hoax? Post-9/11? A hoax implies intent to fool people – calling the aiport saying you left a bomb. Putting obvious ads all over town? Not a hoax! What? You think reasonable people would react that way anywhere; it has nothing to do with Boston?

Turner's statement said that the devices have been in place for two to three weeks in 10 cities, including New York. City officials said yesterday that they were aware of the boxes but had received no complaints.

Hoax, my ass. Buncha wicked scahdey-cats up theyah.

Bloomberg Still Doesn’t Care About Anybody

As I’ve documented in the past, I just do not understand this whole crossover appeal of Michael Bloomberg. Many good die-hard liberal friends of mine voted for him in the last election. But I have always maintained that despite his so-called liberal background, he’s a rich, entitled motherfucker who sold out whatever principles he might have had for both money and the prestige of being mayor – notably bringing the Republican convention to our reality-based enclave during the 2004 presidential election. In short, he’s a selfish asshole who cares for no one but himself.

To wit – on Monday, January 29, (not the beginning of the school year, not when the weather’s accommodating), Bloomberg and the powers that be just decided to up and change the school bus routes. I have no desire to recount the tales I’ve read about 7 year old kids now taking 3 public buses to get to school, getting up at 4am and the like. Suffice it to say, it’s horrible for the parents and the kids, and good for no one except the city budget that saves a few million dollars because of it. Oh yeah, and did I mention the $3.9 billion surplus they just announced? Yeah, well…

Anyway, after the public uproar and obvious fiascoishness of the entire affair, do you suppose Bloomberg is reevaluating anything? Are you kidding? We’re talking about saving a buck here!

Mr. Bloomberg, who since winning mayoral control of the schools has often said he should be held responsible, staunchly defended the changes yesterday. He said that the problems were minimal and that many parents had been using bus service to which they were not entitled under school system rules dating back to the 1980s.

You’re not entitled to a bus anyway. Here’s a dollar, buy a cup of go fuck yourself.

Where Is Everybody?

My friend was down in New Orleans last week. He and his friends went down with the intention of getting their drink on, but his friends who still live in the area insisted he visit the disaster areas. He was moved by the experience, and so was I.
Check it out.

When the Title of Your Book is Your Job Description

The new pastry chef for the White House, Bill Yosses, has one credit Laura neglected to mention. Yeah, he wrote the book pictured to your right. It's not a joke.

Courtesy of This Modern World...

Baghdad Meets Sundance

As loyal DoGgers hanging on my every suggestion, you've no doubt been keeping up with Whitney's adventures at Sundance by clicking on the What We're, Like, Totally Into Right Now&trade link to your left. While the updates have been engaging and fun, mostly involving her latest run-in with Paul Rudd or Dwight from The Office or longtime crushee Barry Zito, sometimes Entertainment Weekly's interests cross paths with ours here at DoG.

There's a documentary at Sundance this year called No End in Sight. I'll let people more talented than me explain:

On May 1, 2003, President Bush declared an end to combat in Iraq. More than three years later, 3,000 American soldiers and an estimated 790,000 civilians are dead, and Iraq still burns. What happened? The first film to examine comprehensively how the Bush administration constructed the Iraq war and subsequent occupation, No End in Sight exposes a chain of critical errors, denial, and incompetence that has galvanized a violent quagmire.

Whitney sat down with the director Charles Ferguson, Brookings Fellow and MIT grad -- no peacenik -- for a serious interview. And it's a good one. Check it out.

Redneck Bullshit

I found this article on Deadspin of all places. In Georgia, a 20 year old man (kid) is serving a 10 year sentence without possibility of parole because of an uptight, bullshit, religious, hypocrisy-laden, judgmental archaic law. When he was 17, he participated in oral sex with a 15 year old girl. The law says it’s ok (not “ok,” but not a felony) to have natural, God-approved, heterosexual penis-in-vagina sex if the kids are within three years of each other. But if anyone wanders downtown, it’s off to the fucking slammer.

When he was a senior in high school, he received oral sex from a 10th grader. He was 17. She was 15. Everyone, including the girl and the prosecution, agreed she initiated the act. But because of an archaic Georgia law, it was a misdemeanor for teenagers less than three years apart to have sexual intercourse, but a felony for the same kids to have oral sex.

Oh, and it gets worse.

Afterward, the state legislature changed the law to include an oral sex clause, but that doesn't help Wilson. In yet another baffling twist, the law was written to not apply to cases retroactively…

Read for yourself, but prepare to feel outraged. Unless, of course, you are one of the judgmental assholes who is frightened and disgusted by sex and feel the need to impose your will on others. In which case, I guess you win this round. Cheers!

The State of the Union is Strong

Good to know, eh? It’s funny, actually, because he saved that until the end. Until, you know, he had the initially hostile audience in the palm of his hand, then laid that applause line on the table and the crowd erupted like face-painting Rangers fans seeing the game winner in overtime. Oh yes, Bush is the puppetmaster.

Anyway… the speech last night was pretty boring. I wrote up a minute-by-minute, but trust me, you’ll prefer my pithy observations. Bush started the night embarrassing himself fawning over “Madame” Speaker, and without even a tinge of sarcasm spoke of it being his honor to be alongside her. He went on to congratulate the Democratic party for their victory in November. One problem with that. He said, “Some in this chamber are new to the House and the Senate -- and I congratulate the Democrat majority.” Even when he’s trying to pretend to be humble, he can’t stop his assholishness. The use of the word “Democrat” instead of “Democratic” is a right-wing slur used intentionally to get under Democrats' skin. And if you don’t believe me, read this piece by Hendrik Hertzberg. I also find it interesting that CBS felt the need to change it to Democratic in their transcript. What else does CBS touch up for him?

What else happened?

• We are going to need Harrison Ford to go to Nancy Pelosi’s office and perform one of his replicant tests. She was blinking as though the force of her blinks could be harvested as an alternative energy source.
  
• Some domestic initiatives. Some he might have cared about (“fix” Social Security and Medicare, vouchers for kids to go to religious schools and abandon public schools altogether), some he most likely didn’t (balance the budget). And some interesting ones like a tax break for payroll taxes to help with health care costs. Payroll taxes are for working people, not rich fucks. Someone must have screwed up. He’s all over the place with his immigration stuff. It's the same old stuff, but this time it might get passed.
  
• Two things I liked – he wants to make earmarks public. I know he has his own reasons for wanting this, but I’m still for it. And then he moved into energy policy. I don’t know the details, but he wants to increase fuel economy and diversify our energy sources. I doubt he’ll fight for anything like that, but it’s nice to hear some stuff you agree with for the first time in six years.
  
• Then it goes “war, war, September the 11th, war, war, extremists, war, democracy, have patience with the plan and support the troops!” So you know, everybody has no choice but to stand and applaud. It goes on like that for a while until…
  
• The heroes in the audience section. My favorite? The Subway Hero who raised his hands like Eva Peron on the balcony (pictured above), and blew kisses to President Bush like Sammy Sosa to Jesus Christ. It was something. Also Dikembe Mutombo was sitting next to Laura… I know!

Anyway, that was about it. Jim Webb gave a pretty moving speech afterwards as the Democratic response, saying that Bush’s war is one big clusterfuck and he can’t be trusted to get us out. I liked it.

Then I watched Veronica Mars. Anyone have any thoughts to share?

True Modern Day Heroes

I’m not kidding. I would kiss this flight crew on the mouth.

Flight attendants often deal with obnoxious passengers who won't listen to instructions by kicking them off the plane. But a Massachusetts couple think AirTran Airways went overboard by treating their crying 3-year-old daughter in much the same way.

Julie and Gerry Kulesza and daughter Elly were removed from the flight when the girl refused to take her seat before takeoff, airline officials said Tuesday. But her parents said they just needed a little more time to calm her down.

It is about fucking time that someone stood up to the fami-stapo!! These days children are coddled more and more and more; they are never taught boundaries by their parents; they never learn the difference between home voice and public voice. So the kids grow up never learning that it’s not ok to scream and shout in a public place. And we as a society look the other way because it’s so doggone hard to raise kids these days. This is true. And because I don’t want to deal with the screaming and whining and crying is why I don’t have children. So why should I be subjected to that torture just because at times I need to interact with the rest of humanity?

Parents grow numb to their own children’s demonic behavior so they don’t notice (or care) how fucking annoying a kid kicking your seat or screeching at the top of its lungs can be. It is time that we stand up to them and say, “Hey! You! You raised a fucking brat! Shut it up, or I’ll do it for you!”

And for the last time, when you become a parent, that means you make sacrifices. You can’t go out drinking all night anymore. You can't spend all your money on xBox games living on a diet of Ramen noodles and Mountain Dew. And if your kid can’t shut up and sit tight, then you have to sacrifice air travel. Life is about choices. You made your choice to have children. Now deal with the consequences. We shouldn’t have to be the ones to suffer for your choice.

Does AirTran fly to New York? They’re my new favorite.

You Say Potato, I Say Terrorist

The Republicans and their goons in the “liberal” media don’t even bother to pretend like they have standards or ethics or even a passing interest in facts anymore. This time, Fox News and Fox’s slightly literate half-brother the New York Post ran with a story about Senator Obama being in some wacky Islamic madrassa when he was a kid.

Problem? It took CNN like two seconds to figure out it was bullshit.

But see, that doesn’t matter. Fox and the Post, not being journalistic entities, but in fact paid propagandists for the Bush Administration don’t care what’s not true. They just want the impression of something. They don’t need to demonstrate facts to their redneck, mouth-breathing audience. They just need to float ideas out there for a while and let the fucktards run with their own ignorance. Fucktards like this:

One Fox News caller questioned whether Obama’s schooling means that “maybe he doesn’t consider terrorists the enemy.” Fox anchor Brian Kilmeade responded, “Well, we’ll see about that.”

Christ, this is going to be a long two years. But hey! The penultimate Bush SOTU tonight! Think about it…

Papa Bear

Did you watch the O’Reilly/Colbert smackdown last night? I enjoyed it. Click below for clips. When I find the entire videos, I'll post them instead. Check back...

UPDATE: Got the full clips.

Colbert on O'Reilly:


O'Reilly on Colbert:

A True Man of the People

I apologize for harping on this. Despite my harsh words yesterday, I honestly do understand that this is an issue that matters only to the 174,000 of us who went a week without power. I do.

However when Michael Bloomberg, the landslide winning, crossover appealing non-presidential candidate chimes in on the blackout, it becomes at least of some interest to others, doesn’t it? It will when you read what he said:

“If you want lousy electrical service, you keep trying to drive Con Ed, Burke out of office,” said Bloomberg. “And then you won't have as good people, and they won't do as good a job.”

Bloomberg defended Burke, a day after the state's Public Service Commission issued a harsh preliminary report on Con Ed, blaming the power company for last July's devastating blackout in Northwest Queens.

The mayor said he had not read the findings, yet, but described the Con Ed boss as competent and hard working, words similar to the ones he used in July during the middle of the power outage.
…

“If you want to fine Con Ed, just go to your electric bill next time you get it and you're going to have a higher cost,” said Bloomberg. “You're going to pay the fines. If you want to fine yourself, that's probably a good idea.”

His Honor went on to say, “I mean, fuck it, whattya gonna do? They got you by the balls. Hey, you got a power plant? No? Well, until you get hydroelectric in your basement, shut the fuck up and do what ConEd tells you. Capisce? I’m just the mayor over here. I’m not friggin’ God.”

The One Where Grandma Sweat Herself to Death

Remember last year’s blackout in Queens?

(You’re a selfish prick, you know that? Would it kill you to pay attention to something other than your own bottomless pit of disgusting urges?)

Anyway, a big report came out, and while I know that you think the only people this affects is a bunch of yokels living in one of those boroughs that isn’t Manhattan or Brooklyn, be aware that ConEd’s incompetence is a portend of your own power company’s actions yet to come. And it ain’t like the earth is getting cooler or you can run your central air and plasma screen on switchgrass and wood chips or anything.

Con Edison’s performance in preparing for, and responding to, the outage event was deficient, a gross disservice to its customers. The Company failed to fulfill its responsibilities under Public Service Law.
…

The report details a litany of problems, like how the Con Ed neglected maintenance problems in the Long Island City network and how the poor counting of how many customers were affected prevented the city from sending out emergency resources immediately. Con Ed's numbers were grossly understated, saying just 2,500 customers were hit, while the number was actually 65,000 customers which translates into about 174,000 people; for some reason, 3,000 customers is a threshold for emergency action. [Ed. – 174,000 would make for the 127th largest city in America. Bigger than Ann Arbor, MI and Syracuse, NY, and just behind Little Rock, AR and Reno, NV]

You know, you forget how awful it was to go for a week without power, and then you read this crap and remember everything! The trying to sleep in a windless heat box in 90 degree humid-ass heat. The lack of lights, TiVo, and any place to buy batteries, candles or portable televisions. The waiting in line for dry ice followed by the 30 minute walk to find the beer to put on the dry ice!

Augh! It was a hellish nightmare I hope never to repeat…

Cowards

Every year, the press corps has a giant circle jerk with the president and his minions and they call it the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner. Remember last year? Stephen Colbert got up there and actually spoke truth to power, cementing his legacy as the fake news host with the biggest balls.

As you know, he didn’t just go after the president. He took down the press corps too. And they are delicate flowers with the courage of tiny little bunnies. The guest at this year’s gala? Rich Little. Remember Rich Little? Oh, wait, you were born after 1950? Well, he’s a) surprisingly not dead yet, b) an impressionist, and c) best known for his Nixon, Johnny Carson, Jack Benny etc. That is to say, dead people and others you’ve never heard of, because you know, you were born after 1950. And he’s got nothing of value to say about anything.

I guess Gallagher was unavailable.

New Feature

Our backers keep calling me down to their office near Wall Street hopping mad and full of complaints about our site’s performance. Page views! Repeat visits! Content!! It’s excruciating. All the while I’m sitting there wondering what kind of mad scientist would want to teach these goats to talk and trade junk bonds.

Anyway… In order to ease the minds of Lil' Billy and Patches, I am instituting a new feature here at DoG:

What We’re, Like, Totally Into Right Now

You can find it in the upper left of the page, and it will change from time to time – as we find something we’re, like, totally more into than the last one. It might be something about news or politics. It might be about some new product we wish we could afford. It might be the best place to find garbage and tin cans to eat near Battery Park. You never know. But you’ll check back and find out, won’t you?

Welcome!

As I'm sure you noticed, we have cleaned some house around here. I hope you like it. Listen, calm down... Nothing will change between us. You can still come by anytime if you're jonesin' for shoddily edited, poorly written, insight-free political commentary. And I know you are.

How many of you kept your New Year's resolutions?

My Very Own Liberry

Two Bush/library stories in one day? Oh yes, I am afraid so. It seems that there is some controversy in selecting a location for Bush’s presidential library. I find this amusing for two reasons.

First, the people of Southern Methodist University are wary of being associated with Bush.

About 150 of the university’s 600 faculty members attended the meeting, voicing a range of concerns, particularly on whether the school’s academic freedom and political independence might appear compromised by an association with not only the Bush library but also a museum that would accompany it.

Thomas J. Knock, a professor of history, said the public might have trouble differentiating between the library, museum and the university.

That is a religious university in Texas that is worried about being associated with George W. Bush. Damn, that’s some low approval ratings.

But the second, and more amusing point is that the deal is being done the same way Bush has done everything since he came to office – in secret, behind closed doors.

“There’s been a lack of transparency from the beginning,” said Tony Pederson of the journalism faculty, urging the university’s administration “to be more forthcoming with detailed information.”
…

Rhonda Blair, the president of the faculty senate who convened the meeting even though many professors were still away on winter break, said she would pass on the questions to Dr. Turner on Wednesday.

That’s just selecting a location for a presidential library and these people can’t cooperate with others. Does Bush use CIA computers to encrypt his breakfast order?

Second Verse Same as the First

Bush is going to be up in the story box tonight. I know I can’t wait. Just thank Jesus Christ that he didn’t wait until Lost started up again. Anyway, apparently, it’s going to be the same old nonsense as always, with one big change in policy:

The speech will be televised from the White House library, "chosen because it will provide a fresh backdrop for a presidential message."

I, for one, am excited. Bush’s first trip into a library!

Oh yeah, and he’s going to throw another 20,000 kids into harm’s way even though the generals say it won’t do any good, and that we really can’t spare any. Good plan! I mean, you gotta do something, right, Georgie? Something other than admit you made a fucking mistake.

S_DD_M _USS_ _N

It’s a rare day indeed when I agree with the Trotskyist turned Bush backer Christopher Hitchens. But when he writes, “The disgusting video of Saddam Hussein's last moments on the planet is more than a reminder of the inescapable barbarity of capital punishment and of the intelligible and conventional reasons why it should always be opposed,” it becomes one of those days.

If you watch that video, and I have, because I’m an idiot, it is inescapable the conclusion that Hitchens reaches – “To watch this abysmal spectacle as a neutral would be bad enough. To know that the U. S. government had even a silent, shamefaced part in it is to feel something well beyond embarrassment.”

He goes on to say a lot more, (including quoting my favorite author), but what he doesn’t mention is the anger I feel at our government for putting us through this spectacle from the beginning. When you take a dictator out and you want to go through the pretense of a trial, you cannot let him be tried by the supposedly impartial people who he tortured and slaughtered. It is complete folly. You have two choices – either you string him up right where you stand the instant you catch him and watch him slowly die before you, or you put him through a legitimate trial in a war crimes tribunal in Belgium. To put it another way, if I murder your family, you don’t get to sit on my jury.

While Saddam is no doubt guilty, and probably deserves the death penalty (which I am steadfastly against, whether it’s Saddam Hussein, Adolf Hitler, or people trying to choose their new cellphone ringtone on a crowded subway train), to put him up in a kangaroo court where the outcome is predetermined, and the only reason for which is to justify his murder ends up making me feel sorry for Saddam. And that just pisses me off!

This whole courtroom is out of order!

Ask Not What Your Country Can Do For You…

Ask what your Congress can do for the president!

Ah yes, President Bush -- the King of Cooperation; the Prince of Partnership; the Chieftain of Charity; the Captain of Compliance -- that President Bush is pleading with the newly elected Democratic Congress to just please, please, let him get some work done. For God’s sake, he’s been in office for 6 years now with both houses controlled by his own party, yet there’s so much left to destroy do!

Indeed, the president actually sat down and “wrote” an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal this morning entitled, get this, What the Congress Can Do for America.

So, let’s ask. What can Congress do for America? For starters, they (the Democrats) can be bipartisan. Not bipartisan in the way Bush is bipartisan, mind you, (which is to say – inflaming your partisan base and stoking the fires of hatred between peoples). More bipartisan in like, the way that a bank teller is bipartisan with an armed robber.

The Democrats can help America by finding common ground with the president without compromising their principles. Or to put it another way - by completely ignoring their principles.

Democrats can help America by listening to the the common “sense” (dare I say common wisdom?) of George W. Bush who believes that government plays a strong role in helping people, but that people aren’t helped by government at all – only by people who care about helping. Which explains the response during that whole hurricane thingee.

The president says that we now (finally) “have the opportunity to build a bipartisan consensus to fight and win the war.” Past six years – no need/opportunity for compromise, listening, cooperation, planning. Now? Plenty of opportunity. It’s simple mathematics.

It is a fact that economies do best when you reward hard work by allowing people to keep more of what they have earned.

It’s a fact, jack!

It is also a fact that our tax cuts have fueled robust economic growth and record revenues.

Dude! Preachin’ to the choir here, brother! Give me those tasty, tasty tax cuts. I will take a bite and let the juices stream down my chin! I am livin’ the American dream! Oh, an aside, Mr. President – can y’all point the way to one of those offshore tax shelters? Right now, I am raking in all this dough, and frankly, I don’t want to pay taxes on any of it. Wherever Lord Vader put Halliburton is fine with me. Ah, but let's return to the story:

By continuing these policies, we can balance the federal budget by 2012 while funding our priorities and making the tax cuts permanent.

Sweet!! Damn, I ain’t never heard of no war that pays for itself while you cut taxes. Fuck me, this guy is a genius. I mean, think about it. He took a huge budget surplus, ran up the deficit to the highest it’s ever been, and the man is going to balance the budget only 12 years later. Watch your back, Pierce, pretty soon you might be the worst president ever once again!

But seriously, George. What can Congress really do for you? What do you need? What’s on your Amazon wish list?

It's time Congress give the president a line-item veto.

Awww, shit! Dude, you got a gigantic fucking pair of melons dangling between your legs. You spent the last 6 years ignoring the bills your own party passed with your signing statements and you ask the Democrats to give you a line-item veto? Wow. What’s left to say after that?

If the Congress chooses to pass bills that are simply political statements, they will have chosen stalemate. If a different approach is taken, the next two years can be fruitful ones for our nation.

I couldn’t agree more, Mr. President. I couldn’t agree more.

Look Who’s Honoring Me Now

I was asked by the Young Professionals of Chicago to write an editorial about Barack Obama. I immediately informed them that I am neither from Chicago nor professional in any sense of the word, but they insisted. I complied with their wishes. Who am I to deny those up and comers out in the Central Time Zone the gift of my wisdom?

Anyway, enjoy...

Obameter: Who's Hot and Who's Not in '08

Happy New Year!

Welcome to 2007, loyal DoG fans. I don't believe in new year's resolutions because if you want to make changes in your life, why do you need to wait for our arbitrary Gregorian calendar to tell you when to do it?

That said, in 2007 I resolve to:

• Write more often
  
• Update our design

But not today. Please stay tuned, and thank you for dropping by!

War on the Message of Christmas?

Another friend of DoG is making headlines. Enjoy this column by Scott Korb and Leon Morris about the lack of Christ in Christmas, particularly among its self-appointed warriors.

They've got a book coming out someday; stay tuned for the plug.

This Is Not My Beautiful House

Please make your way to this column by erstwhile associate of these pages, first-time contributor to the New York Times, and arguably the svengali behind the inception of your Delusions of Grandeur.

Note the (not so) subtle shout out, which I'm told was intentional. Then mourn the loss of a New York landmark.

Give Peace Wreath a Chance

Some defensive right-wing homeowners’ association overlords board members in Denver declared a wreath shaped like a peace symbol to be a crime against Christmas and imposed a $25/day fine on its displayers last week.

Well, peace won -- this time -- and the board members resigned. Inside sources tell us the allegedly Christian board members were handed a bible and were shocked to discover that when Christmas was first invented, it wasn’t to feed the engine of soul-sucking mass consumerism, but in fact to celebrate the birth of a noted hippy peace activist.

They may have capitulated in this instance but on their way home from their final board meeting, they drew the line at a ghastly tune on the radio in which herald angels declare peace on earth and a merciful God reconciles with sinners. “Not while I’m around, He’s not!” and immediately proceeded to the nearest Christian book store to buy the hottest video game in red state America so they could “waste some heathens.”

Reverse Missionaries

Through Wonkette, I came across this hilarious story about a poor Polish exchange student who came to North Carolina for a year, only to find out that his host family was drunk on the Jesus. They forced him to go to church at 6 in the morning, forbade him coffee, declared that the devil lived in his heart because he liked wine (didn’t Jesus like wine?), and so on.

Oh, and they were just using him to help them open a church in Krakow in the first place. How Christlike. God, I love examples of the hypocrisy and cruelty of Christians. It’s like crucifying fish in a barrel.

Well, if Anyone Deserves to be Called a "Minority Whip..."

...I guess it's Trent Lott. Apparently he's not racist anymore, so he's got that going for him.

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME):
We understand what happened. There’s no point going over. It’s in the past now, you know, and he has expressed, you know, his deep regret, as he should.

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ):
I think most people think he paid a pretty heavy price for the mistake that he made. We all believe in redemption, thank God.

Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE):
Everyone has an opportunity to rehabilitate themselves if they want to do it, and I admire Trent Lott for coming back and offering himself. The conference spoke, and we go forward.

Well, I'm glad that's settled. Maybe they should get whoever got Trent to suddenly stop being a racist to go to work on Ted Haggard. He'll start getting his massages from naked ladies instead of male prostitutes in no time.

I Think You Might be Missing the Point...

Hey, guess who finally visited Vietnam? He was about 38 years too late, but who's counting, right? So what lessons did The President, who bravely fought to keep Charlie out of Houston (at least when he felt like it) take away from his experience? Uh...

President Bush said Friday the United States' unsuccessful war in Vietnam three decades ago offered lessons for the American-led struggle in
Iraq. "We'll succeed unless we quit," Bush said shortly after arriving in this one-time war capital.

First of all, did he just call Nixon a quitter? Dag, yo. Second, so... 10 years and 57,000 U.S. soldiers killed wasn't enough, apparently, to succeed in Vietnam. We'd have won if only that cut-and-run liberal pussy Richard Nixon hadn't called the whole thing off. Well, that's good enough for me! My confidence in Bush's "plan" for victory in Iraq has never been higher!

Bush said that "the world that we live in today is one where they want things to happen immediately and it's hard work in Iraq."

Bush said he assured Howard that "we will get the job done" and will stand with the embattled government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

"We'll succeed unless we quit," Bush said. "The Maliki government is going to make it unless the coalition leaves before they have a chance to make it."

If only we'd had a leader with Bush's steely resolve back during the Vietnam war, thing would have turned out differently... somehow! Probably more dead people. And we would have shown those goddam commies who's... oh wait, that already happened anyway. Hell, we'd probably all live in mansions and it would rain donuts every morning. The point is, we just weren't patient enough.

Of course, following Bush's "don't-you-dare-call-it-stay-the-course" gambit, we'd still be in Vietnam, and Bush would presumably still be AWOL from the Texas Air Nation Guard, with his face buried in a pile of blow. Therefore, we wouldn't have Bush as President during the Vietnam war, which means we wouldn't still be staying the course in Viet-- brrrrrrrrzzzzzzzzzzzp brrrrrrraaaakkkkkkkkkkkkkkk logic overload zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzttttt error does not comp-- KABOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!

Terrible Twos

We missed it again! We here at DoG HQ would like to belatedly wish ourselves a very happy second birthday.

Back after Bush stole the White House for the second time, who could possibly have imagined that we’d be able to maintain the consistent level of low-quality writing mixed with childlike attention to detail and obsessive need for vulgarity for two whole years? Add a splash of plagiarism, a pinch of righteous indignation, fill to the rim with your favorite brand of whiskey, shake vigorously, and pour -- careful to strain out the nuance and insight -- et voila! Enjoy your delicious Delusions of Grandeur cocktail on the rocks or straight up. Either way, it’s sure to give you a throbbing headache in the morning.

Thanks for reading, everyone! You might prefer to keep silent, but we know you’re out there. And we love you all... (Not in that way! Seriously - hands off, Plano, Texas.)

All Part of This Fair and Balanced Breakfast

OJ is a murderer and an asshole. Duh. But now he's got a new confessional and a TV special brought to you by the bringers of other winners like Sluts on an Island and the paranoia-induced War on the Most Popular Holiday in the History of Humanity.

Well look, America - this attention-starved criminal doesn't make a dime if you don't buy the book and if you don't watch the show. You showed me that my faith in you is well placed after the 2006 elections. Don't let me down.

By the way, it's worth noting that not only is this show on Fox, but the book is published by a nice young lady who used to have her own show on FoxNews, and her publishing house is a subsidiary of News Corp - also known as Fox. If you're looking for an attack on down home "American Values" you need look no further than that.

Shake ‘em Up, Shake ‘em Up, Shake ‘em Up, Shake ‘em...

How great was yesterday? We awake to find the Democrats have taken the House, the Senate, the majority of governorships, Rummy’s out and Bush is runnin’ scared like a little bitch. I even saw CNN correct someone when they used the term “dissemble” to describe how Bush was for Rumsfeld before he was against him. “You know, I think we could even call that a lie, don’t you think?”

Boy, Democrats take congress and now they’re finally allowed to call Bush a liar? What a bunch of cowards.

Anyway… There’s this one thing about Bush’s little press conference yesterday that bothers me. Don’t get me wrong, I’m practically drowning in schadenfreude over here. But yesterday in trying to explain why he lied about Rummy, Bush said, “I didn't want to inject a major decision about this war in the final days of a campaign.” I know, I know, he says stupid things all the time, but holy shit, that’s a whopper! He didn’t want to inject a major decision into a campaign? How about insisting that the Saddam Hussein kangaroo court release its prix fixe verdict on Sunday before election day. How about all the false terror alerts in 2004? I mean, give me a break. He meant to say, “I didn’t want to release something that might hurt Republicans during the campaign.”

The irony is, that’s the one thing that actually might have helped – if he could admit he was wrong about something. Anything.

Oh well… Sucks to your ass-mar!

Yo Campaign Manager So Fat…

Check out this wicked burn on Rove by his own BFF:

Another reporter asked the president about a book-reading contest he's having with Karl Rove. "I'm losing," he said. "Obviously, I was working harder on the campaign than he was."

Awww, SNAP!

Although come to think of it… Did he burn himself?

Getting Better All the Time

Rumsfeld resigns, effective immediately.

AP: Tester wins Montana.

Come on, Virginia!!


UPDATE: Something occurred to me. Doesn’t Rumsfeld quitting his job like two seconds after the Democrats take the House look a little fishy to you? Like the way that speed-freak gay homophobe preacher went down -- I’m completely innocent of the charges!!! I have this voice mail. I quit!

It’s like that.

Bush: “I have complete faith in Rumsfeld and he will stay with me for the remainder of my term in office”

Prez aide: “The Democrats took the House and now they have subpoena power.”

Bush: “Shit! Rummy, pack your bags and get on the first boat the hell out of here! Do not look at me on your way out.”
...

Bush: “I will fucking cut the eyes out of your head with this butter knife! Get out of my office!”

Or something like that…

I Stand Corrected

Wow! What a beautiful morning. The Democrats take the House, and it’s down to Montana and Virginia in the Senate.

I guess Karl Rove’s GOTV/voter suppression plan wasn’t quite good enough.

Now, think about this – we held every seat we needed to, and we also took Ohio, Rhode Island, Missouri, and Pennsylvania (go fuck a dog, Santorum!). And the best part is when the recounting starts in VA and MT, the Democrats are slightly ahead in the polls. It may not sound like much but I’d rather be ahead, hoping to hold than to be behind and hoping for a miracle.

The Ingenuity of the American People

Can we solve the hunger crisis? Fresh, clean water for all? Social Security? War? Crime? Drugs? We could if half the effort went into those issues as goes into cheating to win elections. Damn, no stone will go unturned.

Northern California radio stations got something extra Monday with the monthly emergency alert system test transmitted by fellow station KFBK and at least one of them was none too happy about it.

The test, complete with raspy alarm and tone, didn't end with the familiar words, "This concludes the test of the Emergency Alert System..."

Instead, it segued into a political advertisement by former state Sen. Dick Mountjoy, who is running for the U.S. Senate against Democratic incumbent Dianne Feinstein, and another spot for a mortgage company.
…

As a result, KFBK's regular programming -- in this case, the ads -- took over the airwaves at radio stations in 17 Northern California counties, and perhaps even the audio of some television stations.
…

Edward Martinet, general manager at non-profit community station KDVS in Davis, said he was skeptical of the explanation.

"It would have to be some amazingly egregious negligence to not notice it for two minutes," he said.

And as Salon goes on to point out:

KFBK, owned by Clear Channel Communications, is the station that gave birth to Rush Limbaugh's radio show.

I’m sure it’s just a coincidence.

Happy Holidays!

Here we are - election day. Yippee!! Today is the day we all go to the polls and hope that our vote is one of the percentage that actually gets counted. Or in some cases, from the looks of it, we go to the polls, wait an hour in the rain and go home pissed off that after 200 years, we can’t find a fucking way to reliably count the votes.

This bothers me. I don’t know how you feel, but this doesn’t seem like democracy to me. The Republicans are pulling every trick in the book to suppress the vote and nobody cares. It’s par for the course in a democracy, right?

No!

It is not the point of democracy to allow the system to devolve into a battle of who cheats better. It’s supposed to be a polling of the people in order to choose their new leaders. We shouldn’t have to place our “faith” in the words of a voting machine manufacturer that the booth works, or to assume that the Republican and Democratic parties would not cheat and change the votes because well, that would be like something Saddam Hussein would do. These people are paid to win; nothing short of victory will suffice. We shouldn’t have to “trust” these people and institutions. We should have absolute scientific proof of the accuracy of the count, whatever the count happens to be. Anything less than that is not democracy. Without democracy, we have nothing. Without a real vote, our leaders cannot be held accountable for their actions. Hey, maybe that worked for Augustus Caesar and Louis XIV, but how’d it go with Nero and Napoleon? Not so much.

No matter what happens tonight -- and Spaghetti Monster-willing enough of you Democrats will go to the polls to overcome the eight ball of gerrymandering and voting fraud the Republicans have put us behind -- I won’t honestly trust the vote. Our politicians have to wake up and fix this their very next day in office. Voting machines that accurately count the votes and can be verified. More voting machines in all districts, not just in the rich ones. Accountability in advertising and immediate shutdown of illegal election tampering operations. Most importantly, we need public financing of elections to get the corruption out of government. Oh, and also I need a rocket ship to the moon, and Natalie Portman to stop by my place tonight after she votes.

So what do you think? Do we live in the United States of America or a South American junta? Maybe we find out tonight…

Happy voting!

Let’s Get It On

Ladies, it’s time to loosen up and let your freak flag fly. Australian researchers have shown that if you whore yourself around town, you’ll have babies with like super strength or something. I paraphrase…

Scientists at the Australian National University said they had proven for the first time that frequent sex with multiple partners increased the survival rate of offspring in an animal species.

The team's reproductive revelation comes after two years spent probing the sex life of the brown antechinus, a small mouse-sized carnivorous marsupial found in forests in southeastern Australia, which is related to the Tasmanian Devil.

So there you have it, girls. Break out Tuesday’s slutstume, find yourself a human male and get to it. I mean, you don’t want to have puny little weakling babies, do you?

Despite the advantages to the species from free love, males usually died after a short and intense single mating season due to exhaustion and aggressive encounters with other males.

Oh… Uh… Ladies? Hold on a sec. Let’s be reasonable here. The game is on, for crying out loud!

Sometimes a Penis Is Just a Penis

Nathanial Frank busts out the old Psych 101 textbook for some thoughtful analysis:

What are we to make of a reigning conservative regime that lists the following inglorious claims to fame: Strom Thurmond, a notoriously racist senator who turned out to have a black lover; a Republican indictment of President Clinton's sexual license headed up by a team of philanderers; a Congress full of divorces passing an anti-gay law known as the "Defense of Marriage Act"? In the pundit corner, we recently saw three giants of conservative moralizing unmasked as incapable of restraining their own vices: William Bennett turned out to be addicted to gambling, Rush Limbaugh to drugs. Meanwhile, Ralph Reed, the hand-picked youthful leader of the religious right, was quietly helping the corrupt lobbyist, Jack Abramoff, enable everything that religious conservatives oppose: casinos on Indian reservations and compelled abortions and sex slavery in the Northern Mariana Islands, an American territory. And this is not even to mention the Catholic Church's strident indictment of sexual freedom as it shuffled its own cadre of child-molesting priests from parish to parish.
…

For answers to the puzzles that seem to infest the conservative worldview, we might dust off our old Freud texts. From the father of psychoanalysis, we learn the concept of "reaction formation" which describes how we react to our own unacceptable impulses. Reaction formation is a classic "defense mechanism"-an unconscious behavior designed to ward off uncomfortable feelings. Sometimes we react to our discomfort with ourselves in harmless ways, such as when a man cheats on his wife and brings her flowers to ease his guilt. Other times, the reactions can be punitive-we judge and condemn others who exhibit the very impulses that we, ourselves, cannot control. This is frequently the case when dealing with lust or greed. "Sooner or later," writes Michael Warner, a Professor of English at Rutgers and a leading theorist of sexuality and politics, "we all lose control over our sex life. As a result, we try to control someone else's sex life."

Bush has a word or two about terrorists and Islamic fascists, doesn’t he? What are you covering up, Mr. President?!

Er… Nevermind. There’s not enough time in the world.

What? No Reach Around?

Don’t you love the poetic justice of an evil motherfucker brought down by the very thing that makes him evil? Maybe you have spent your life judging others’ vices, when it turns out you spend weekends at a time gambling away millions. Or perhaps you enjoy talking about the sanctity of marriage, but then run off with your 23 year old mistress leaving your cancer-stricken wife to fend for herself, alone in the hospital. Maybe you run a presidential campaign based on compassion and preside over the most sadistic administration in American history.

Or maybe, just maybe, you are a messianic figure with tens of thousands of zealous vassals in the movement to wipe those dirty faggots off the face of the earth and it turns out that you’ve been taking it up the ass on a regular basis for some time now.

Ted Haggard, seen to your right demonstrating how he likes to receive his creamy white prize, is an evangelical leader who just happens to be the cowboy-boot wearin’, brush clearin’, manly sort of religonut who gets the president’s ear. So much so that they had a weekly conference call to coordinate their attack on people’s civil rights. I’m guessing Bush won’t be taking those calls no more.

Michael Forest Jones, 49, of Denver alleges he had sex on a monthly basis with Haggard over three years. Jones claimed Haggard used the name "Art," admitted he was married and used meth before the two had sex.
...

Late Thursday, The Associated Press reported that the acting senior pastor at New Life, Ross Parsley, told KKTV-TV of Colorado Springs that Haggard admitted some of the accusations were true, but Parsley didn't elaborate.

The timing of the disclosure has stirred controversy, coming days before Colorado voters will decide on two measures related to gay rights and marriage. Haggard is a chief supporter of Amendment 43, which would define marriage as only between a man and a woman, and he has taken no position on Referendum I, which would grant domestic- partnership rights to same-sex couples.

Haggard is unquestionably a national figure. Since founding New Life Church in his basement in the 1980s, the son of an Indiana veterinarian has ascended the ranks of evangelical leaders, taking part in White House conference calls, counseling foreign leaders and being named by Time magazine as one of the nation's 25 most influential evangelicals.
...

They met at least once a month at Jones' Denver apartment, and Haggard paid cash, Jones said. "He was very nice and very soft-spoken," Jones said. "We never talked about anything heavy-duty."

Jones alleged Haggard snorted a small amount of methamphetamine that he brought with him at least a dozen times to enhance the sexual pleasure.

Oh well. Just leave your career on the nightstand and sneak back home to your beard and kids…

What a minute, maybe he’s not a hypocrite at all! Maybe he just has a problem with alcohol! Stay tuned...

Is That a Rise in Your Poll or Are You Just Happy to See Me?

I’m sure it’s too soon to measure the Kerry never met an election he couldn’t blow effect, and we all know how it’s really gonna turn out. Nevertheless, I shall continue to raise my hopes ever higher -- all the more reason to drink myself stupid Tuesday and call in sick Wednesday.

50-49 lead in the Senate, with Missouri too close to call. Missouri, eh? Damn! I hate the fucking Cardinals, but now I’m pinning my hopes on those Eckstein loving assholes? Hmmn… I’m opposed to your Cardinals supporting policy; but I’m in favor of your Budweiser drinking policy! Let’s go with that.

And now they’re saying a 48 seat lead in the house. Polls go up and down, but hey, I’d rather have them say we have a lead than have them say we’re behind.

If You’re Scoring at Home

Look at that over there… No, not there. There! Yeah, that. New polls are in, and by the judgment of the good people at electoral-vote.com, the senate is tied at 50-50, and in the house the Dems had a nice surge since yesterday and now lead by 44 seats. I’m writing it down so we can track it over the next seven days. Yeah, I’m exactly that lame.

It should be noted, however, that these polls fail to take into account the security-free electronic voting booths; vote burning, shredding, tossing, or hiding by the GOP; voter disenfranchisement, intimidation, or ID card requirements; and John Kerry failing to keep his fucking trap shut.

In other words, they’re meaningless.

T-Minus 11 Days

As I’m sure you are all aware, the steel cage match that is the 2006 midterm elections are but a week and a half away. Because we love our readers at DoG, I’ve added an exciting new feature. Which is to say I’ve cut and paste an exciting new feature from somewhere else.

To your left, stage right, you will find an up to the minute electoral results summary provided by the good men and women at www.electoral-vote.com. They read poll results all day, compile them and whatnot and whozit and poof! post a result. I hardly trust polls, and as I’ve said in the past, I officially predict that the Democrats will take neither house of congress.

But it’s always fun to dream… and read promising poll data. Just remember to vote on the 7th, OK?

Here, Swallow These 35 Condoms of Shampoo

When I started reading Patrick Smith’s column Ask the Pilot a few years back, it was primarily a place to send in questions about the more arcane and curious aspects of air travel. “What do all those controls do?” “What’s a flap?” “Are pilots really up to their elbows in poontang?” etc. But more recently -- the last year or two -- he has focused his ire and engaging writing style toward the TSA and their absurd notion of “security.” Today, he perfectly describes how ridiculous and inevitably damaging the security procedures are in the United States these days.

There you have it: Tiny containers of hand sanitizer in zip-lock bags are harmless and approved. Those not in zip-lock bags are dangerous contraband. Meanwhile, the TSA still cannot justify its methods of confiscation: If certain liquids and gels are taken from a passenger, the assumption has to be that those materials are potentially hazardous. If so, why are they tossed unceremoniously into the trash? At every checkpoint you'll see a bin or barrel brimming with illegal containers. They are not quarantined or handed over to the bomb squad; they are thrown away. In effect, the agency readily admits that it knows these things are harmless. But it's going to steal them anyway, and either you like it or you don't fly.

…the madness has become patently abject, and people need to realize they are subsidizing it. More than 2 million Americans experience the carnival of airport security every day. An apparatus that big takes a lot of dough to keep it running. First, our taxes pay for the salaries of thousands of airport screeners, and for all the many overpriced accouterments demanded of a bureaucracy. Then come the trickle-down costs of delays, missed flights and broken appointments, along with the intangibles of widespread tension and anxiety. Last but not least, every dollar fed to the TSA furnace in a bid to keep shampoo off airplanes is a dollar that could have been spent more effectively elsewhere in the security chain. The bill for that one comes later, possibly in the guise of catastrophe.

Or as I’ve said a million times (probably copying Mr. Smith) – it’s more important for them to do something (anything) as opposed to something good. It’s a symptom of Bush’s larger disease of feel-good policy as opposed to good policy. (You like how I keep doing that? No? Fine.)

The administration creates a prescription drug plan that enriches the pharmaceutical companies, confuses the old folks, and wastes our money by the billions, but hey – he did something to help Grandma get her pills. Bush is going to “leave no child behind” by forcing teachers to change their educational plans to teach to the test instead of helping our kids actually learn something, and once again, oops! forget to pay for it, leaving everyone behind. And don’t even get me started on the whole – hey we understand things are going bad in Iraq and now we’re not staying the course anymore, now we’re adapting and adjusting, and hell no Rumsfeld’s not going anywhere (and we’re not changing a thing) thing.

The problem with the airport security issue (as Patrick has hammered home numerous times) is that you all buy into it. Whenever I complain to any of my friends about the absolute uselessness of the airport security procedures, my friend will defend the policies – “Hey, they’re trying.” Or “She’s just doing her job.” Perhaps she is, or perhaps she’s on an adrenaline rush spiked by the tiny amount of power she’s been given and lords it over the executives and the doctors and all the people who did better in school than she did. But more to the point, when the American travelers just roll over like sheep and stand in that line and accept what’s happening in our airports -- warm fuzzies instead of security -- we empower our feckless leaders to choose feel-good politics over effective policy at every goddamned opportunity.

I don’t necessarily have an immediate solution. I’m not suggesting that you stand up and fight the guards at the airport and get yourself on a terrorist watchlist or anything. It’s just important for you to stay annoyed in the security line. Think to yourself that when you missed your flight because they had to x-ray your shoes four times that it wasn’t for the greater good; that it’s a waste of time and money that is simply draining our resources which could be put to use actually *gasp* catching terrorists… for once; that it’s all in place to give you the impression of safety where there is none. And remember it when it comes up as a political issue, whether you’re voting or calling your senator or discussing it at Thanksgiving.

Fight the power!

If Ifs and Buts Were Candy and Nuts...

This just in: Republicans like to beat on the handicapped.

During a debate Sunday that also included Democrat Gary Trauner, Cubin and Rankin had a testy exchange over campaign contributions Cubin received from former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas.

Rankin, who has multiple sclerosis and uses an electric wheelchair, said Monday night in a telephone interview with The Associated Press that the confrontation occurred immediately after the debate.

"My aide and I were packing up to leave the debate, and Barbara walked over to me and said, 'If you weren't sitting in that chair, I'd slap you across the face.' That's quote-unquote," Rankin said.
...

During her tenure, Cubin received $22,520 in campaign contributions from Delay's Americans for a Republican Majority PAC. She has said she would not return the money unless DeLay was convicted of a crime.

Rankin’s lucky he wasn’t debating Cheney or he’d be picking birdshot out of his face by now.

War is Peace! Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength!

Directly from the Ministry of Truth, here is your Two Minutes Hate for the day:

Q: Is there a change in the administration "stay the course" policy? Bartlett this morning said that wasn't ever the policy.

Tony Snow: … So what you have is not "stay the course," but, in fact, a study in constant motion by the administration and by the Iraqi government, and, frankly, also by the enemy, because there are constant shifts, and you constantly have to adjust to what the other side is doing.

OH! NOT stay the course. It’s weird, because I was under the impression that you guys were in favor of staying the course.

BUSH: We will stay the course, we will complete the job in Iraq. [8/4/05]

SNOW: The second thing you do is you stay the course. [7/10/06]

SNOW: But on the other hand, you also cannot be a President in a wartime and not realize that you’ve got to stay the course. [8/17/06]

BUSH: We will stay the course. [8/30/06]

BUSH: We will stay the course until the job is done, Steve. And the temptation is to try to get the President or somebody to put a timetable on the definition of getting the job done. We’re just going to stay the course. [12/15/03]

BUSH: And my message today to those in Iraq is: We’ll stay the course. [4/13/04]

SNOW: People are going to want more of it, and that’s why the President is determined to stay the course. April. [8/16/06]

BUSH: And that’s why we’re going to stay the course in Iraq. And that’s why when we say something in Iraq, we’re going to do it. [4/16/04]

BUSH: And so we’ve got tough action in Iraq. But we will stay the course. [4/5/04]

So, let me get this straight - he wants to cut and run, then?

The Lord Kills in Mysterious Ways

I am thrilled to hear the news that Donald Rumsfeld has hired a new advisor. It takes real courage to admit that you need help.

The top US general defended the leadership of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, saying it is inspired by God.

"He leads in a way that the good Lord tells him is best for our country," said Marine General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

What’s great about this is that we know God is one badass motherfucking killing machine. By one count, God has over 2.2 million confirmed kills. And hey, that’s not even counting the Great Flood or the razing of Sodom and Gomorrah. So, to know that God is talking directly to Rummy telling him how to wipe those fucking towelheads off the face of the earth, well, shit – we are gonna turn this thing around!

Praise Jesus!!

Where Da Politics, Yo?

Blah. Everyone says the Democrats are gonna win. I know they aren’t because I have a memory and frankly it all bores me right now.

What does not bore me is this incident from the Crips vs. Bloods Miami vs. FIU game over the weekend. Helmets flying, three Miami players stomping the living shit out of some dude curled up in a fetal position like they’re in the parking lot of a strip club with their posse, and a commentator wildly cheering the proceedings on declaring that one does not come into the “OB” without getting a proper beatdown. Oh, the life of a thug, indeed.



But wait, there’s one more little twist of brilliance in this tale of honor and dignity. The University of Miami joined forces with the Miami-Dade police department to start the Join-a-Team, Not-a-Gang program and sent some 700 children to that very game to show them how a real man or woman doesn’t need violence and thuggery to “keep it real.”

Now the kids know that if they go to Miami, they don't need to choose.

Bless You Boys!

I guess I will harp on it a little, but hey, I'm effing pumped for tonight!!

In the era of the Super Bowl Shuffle, and yes – New England, the Patriots and We was a lesser known video for the Detroit Tigers from 1984 – Bless You Boys, (This Is The Year). Courtesy of the good men and women at Deadspin, enjoy:



Does the fact that I used to actually sing this song out loud automatically make me gay?

Go Tigers!

I loves me the politics, and I loves me the sports too. I won’t harp on it, but big ups to my hometown Detroit Tigers for beating the Yankees in four and advancing to the ALCS against the A’s.

This victory is triple-sweet for us Tigers fans. For starters, we advance in the playoffs for the first time since the magical 1984 season. Secondly, literally everybody said the Tigers never had a chance. And, not best of all, but pretty close – it’s the fucking Yankees! Man, I hate those guys! And now they’re in full-on tailspin panic mode and they’ll probably make another bunch of harebrained moves like trade one of the best players in baseball (ARod), fire one of the best coaches the Yankees have ever had, and pick up a bunch of overpriced, past-their-prime free agents for a lumbering $300 million dollar payroll next year. And they’ll lose again!

Way to go, Tigers! Bring on the A's!

Larry, Moe, and a Kiddie Fucker

I don’t normally do this, but when I saw this picture, I just couldn’t resist blatantly stealing it and posting it without attribution. That’s just how I roll.


(l to r - Brownie, Satan, Rep. Pedophile (R-FL))

And If I Had A Million Dollars...

By request from our good friends over at PatRoW, watch Mark Foley predict the future on America's Most Wanted:



Hmmn... I bet they can find some DNA samples in Foley's congressional office.