Wow. I finally got to write that headline.
Yes, folks, if you read/watch Michelle Malkin (a notable right-wing wacko/Fox News pundit - two great tastes that taste better together), you would know that Rachel Ray unknowingly lent her support to Islamic Jihad, al Qaeda and the PLO by appearing in an ad for Dunkin Donuts.
Yes, you read that right - Rachel Ray, al Qaeda, Dunkin Donuts.
I CAN'T MAKE THIS KIND OF S**T UP...
Ms. Ray wore a black and white checkered scarf that bears a mild resemblance to the scarves you'd see on Yasser Arafat (and about 500 million other muslims), known as the keffiyah. In other words, terrorists wear them because they are muslim and not because they are terrorists.
Then again, making sure that we see the surface rather than getting any deeper, Ms. Malkin specializes in ruffling people's feathers by saying ridiculously outrageous BS in the name of giving us the NEWS, or whatever it is she spews forth. In the past, she has written a book favoring internment of all muslims (by analogizing that the internment of all Japanese folks from the west coast during WWII was also justified) on the off-chance that some of them might be terrorists, or harbor terrorist sympathies, or look like terrorists, or look like a terrorist she saw on 24.
The funny part? Dunkin Donuts pulled the ad.
Being a white racist myself (and thus voting for an African-American candidate to assuage my liberal guilt), I abhor racism in any form, but I'm not sure if this qualifies. Obviously, Rachel Ray is not a muslim. In fact, her greatest crime is her preternaturally annoying & artificial perkiness, which is so extreme, I think if I met her I might try to push her eyes out through her ears. "STOP SMILING LIKE THAT!" On the other hand, if we want to get racial, Ms. Malkin seems to have it in for anyone who's not white or at least a card-carrying conformist. Non-Republican in other words. She's Filipino. And changed her name to sound whiter.
Sorry, ran off the rails.
It is a not-too subtle form of racism to associate a particular piece of clothing with a particular race or attitude. For example, some people still use their red gingham checkered tablecloths at Christmas time, unknowingly supporting the Khmer Rouge. If we start labeling people by a scarf, can we label them by their shoes? Does Ms. Malkin ever wear f**k-me pumps? If so, what does that make her? A slut? A supporter of prostitutes? Or just a garden variety shoe fetishist?
Or does that make her (like the scarf makes Rachel Ray) someone who liked the look of something, and decided to wear it?
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
The Majority is Speaking in Tongues
Elections Vs. Electorates - the Democrats
The people have spoken, and Senator Hillary Clinton will be the next President of the United States.
According to her.
No matter that Senator Obama has an insurmountable lead in delegates, and many SuperDs are waiting in the wings to endorse him as the front-runner that he already is.
In North Carolina, Obama really slayed 'em, and got the overwhelming majority of delegates. In Indiana, Clinton received a bare two percent more than half the vote, and got a few more delegates - but so did Obama. And she says that this is a deciding factor in whether not she will continue to run. Which she's said after every state she's won; Sen. Clinton is still having math problems. Her surrogates, notably James Carville (doing his best Foghorn Leghorn impersonation EVER), are out there saying, "Hold on there, I say hold on there... You guys just don't understand how all this works." Yes, we do. The person with the most votes, in a contest where the rules were agreed upon in advance by all the candidates, wins. And yet Hillary and her supporters are still insisting that the delegates from Florida and Michigan be counted.
Obama's camp, meanwhile, is certain that it will all be over by May 20th, when they get an unassailable majority of delegates via the popular vote. I'm fairly certain that Hillary will still see this as some sort of victory for her side, but - oh, dear, I've gone cross-eyed.
Reasons to not vote for John McCain
To those of you out there disenchanted with either of the democratic candidates for obvious reasons, here's a list of John McCain's "problems:"
He refers to Clinton and Obama as elites; he owns seven homes and married a woman worth over a hundred million dollars. Does this make him a "regular guy?"
He favors abstinence-only sex education. Which doesn't work, and there have been many studies proving it doesn't work. As well as a lot of living, breathing, babies - er, statistics.
McCain favors charter schools over public (which means less money for public education).
He has been reluctant to fund the reconstruction of New Orleans.
I've already gone over the dumbass gas tax holiday concept that he and Clinton endorsed.
He called his wife a "dumb c**t" in public. Maybe she is, but geez...
He is now for things he used to be against: the war in Iraq, not taxing the rich, and occupying places forever.
He sought and got the endorsements of John Hagee, Rod Parsley and Tim laHaye, three Christian Zionists and generally religious nutbags that either believe that America was founded in order to destroy Islam (Parsley) or that the only way Jesus is comin' back is if Israel gets its act together and rebuilds the Temple where the Dome of the Rock (one of the holiest places in Islam) is currently standing, thus starting off a holy war in the middle east and (of course) guaranteeing the return of Jesus and the beginning of the End Times (Hagee and laHaye). McCain refers to Parsley as his "spiritual guide."
He wants to discontinue the tax break that corporations get for giving their employees subsidized health insurance, and bring it back to the competitive marketplace - thus ensuring that even fewer people will have health insurance.
I can't find the quote, but someone said this about McCain's attitude towards our staying in Iraq: "We're staying until the killings stop, or staying until we can make the killings stop. And then we'll stay." He talks about us staying in the middle east the same way we're staying in places like Germany, Japan, etc. My personal favorite response to this particular idea was put out there by Ecuador - the United States can continue to have an (enormous!) airbase in Ecuador (war on drugs), so long as Ecuador can put one of their own airbases in South Florida - fair's fair.
He likes the judges that Bush has picked. Roberts, Alito. He also likes the other judges that were the models for picking Roberts and Alito, i.e., Scalia and Thomas. These judges believe that corporations have more (and better) rights than people. They are what is commonly known as Strict Constructionists or Federalists. This is the belief that the Constitution should be read as it was written, without all those nasty Amendment things. This, of course, is directly at odds with the founding fathers concept of a living, breathing constitution. Jefferson even thought we'd have to rewrite it every twenty years or so. These jurists are also not fond of the separation of Church and State. Be assured, if McCain is elected, we will get more of these weird men who want prayer in school, no right to choose for women (which might include birth control pills), and executing people for spitting on the sidewalk.
Okay, I made that last one up, but it sure sounds good.
The people have spoken, and Senator Hillary Clinton will be the next President of the United States.
According to her.
No matter that Senator Obama has an insurmountable lead in delegates, and many SuperDs are waiting in the wings to endorse him as the front-runner that he already is.
In North Carolina, Obama really slayed 'em, and got the overwhelming majority of delegates. In Indiana, Clinton received a bare two percent more than half the vote, and got a few more delegates - but so did Obama. And she says that this is a deciding factor in whether not she will continue to run. Which she's said after every state she's won; Sen. Clinton is still having math problems. Her surrogates, notably James Carville (doing his best Foghorn Leghorn impersonation EVER), are out there saying, "Hold on there, I say hold on there... You guys just don't understand how all this works." Yes, we do. The person with the most votes, in a contest where the rules were agreed upon in advance by all the candidates, wins. And yet Hillary and her supporters are still insisting that the delegates from Florida and Michigan be counted.
Obama's camp, meanwhile, is certain that it will all be over by May 20th, when they get an unassailable majority of delegates via the popular vote. I'm fairly certain that Hillary will still see this as some sort of victory for her side, but - oh, dear, I've gone cross-eyed.
Reasons to not vote for John McCain
To those of you out there disenchanted with either of the democratic candidates for obvious reasons, here's a list of John McCain's "problems:"
He refers to Clinton and Obama as elites; he owns seven homes and married a woman worth over a hundred million dollars. Does this make him a "regular guy?"
He favors abstinence-only sex education. Which doesn't work, and there have been many studies proving it doesn't work. As well as a lot of living, breathing, babies - er, statistics.
McCain favors charter schools over public (which means less money for public education).
He has been reluctant to fund the reconstruction of New Orleans.
I've already gone over the dumbass gas tax holiday concept that he and Clinton endorsed.
He called his wife a "dumb c**t" in public. Maybe she is, but geez...
He is now for things he used to be against: the war in Iraq, not taxing the rich, and occupying places forever.
He sought and got the endorsements of John Hagee, Rod Parsley and Tim laHaye, three Christian Zionists and generally religious nutbags that either believe that America was founded in order to destroy Islam (Parsley) or that the only way Jesus is comin' back is if Israel gets its act together and rebuilds the Temple where the Dome of the Rock (one of the holiest places in Islam) is currently standing, thus starting off a holy war in the middle east and (of course) guaranteeing the return of Jesus and the beginning of the End Times (Hagee and laHaye). McCain refers to Parsley as his "spiritual guide."
He wants to discontinue the tax break that corporations get for giving their employees subsidized health insurance, and bring it back to the competitive marketplace - thus ensuring that even fewer people will have health insurance.
I can't find the quote, but someone said this about McCain's attitude towards our staying in Iraq: "We're staying until the killings stop, or staying until we can make the killings stop. And then we'll stay." He talks about us staying in the middle east the same way we're staying in places like Germany, Japan, etc. My personal favorite response to this particular idea was put out there by Ecuador - the United States can continue to have an (enormous!) airbase in Ecuador (war on drugs), so long as Ecuador can put one of their own airbases in South Florida - fair's fair.
He likes the judges that Bush has picked. Roberts, Alito. He also likes the other judges that were the models for picking Roberts and Alito, i.e., Scalia and Thomas. These judges believe that corporations have more (and better) rights than people. They are what is commonly known as Strict Constructionists or Federalists. This is the belief that the Constitution should be read as it was written, without all those nasty Amendment things. This, of course, is directly at odds with the founding fathers concept of a living, breathing constitution. Jefferson even thought we'd have to rewrite it every twenty years or so. These jurists are also not fond of the separation of Church and State. Be assured, if McCain is elected, we will get more of these weird men who want prayer in school, no right to choose for women (which might include birth control pills), and executing people for spitting on the sidewalk.
Okay, I made that last one up, but it sure sounds good.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Hot Air & Other Expensive Gasses
So, the prophets have spoken, and both Obama and Clinton are appearing or have appeared on the Fox news thing.
How sad is that...
Isn't it enough that they will do all kinds of crap to whatever you say in order to smear you once you're actually the nominee? Whichever one of you that is...
Don't give them ammo, don't talk about the other nominee, talk about policy and only policy and make sure you answer the "when did you stop beating your wife?" questions with a simple "irrelevant." When asked about Reverend Wright, please say, what does he have to do with me (or the other person) being President? Rev. Wright is a man with an opinion, not the mouth of God.
Just stop.
And there are the various proposals for gasoline prices this summer. Clinton and McCain have both decided that we could have a gas tax holiday this summer. This would (according to Obama) give us a break worth half a tank of gas for the whole period, while de-funding the roads and highways trust fund for the summer. Wanna buy a bridge in Minneapolis? Many economists and pundits have weighed in, and they've all come to the same conclusion: gas prices are high, and there is very little we can do about it in the short term. And the high prices are a harbinger of bad things to come (food prices are going up in direct proportion of the gas prices going up), but perhaps the high gas prices will finally persuade Americans that the free ride is pretty much over.
To those of you out there riding around in big-ass four-wheel-drive SUVs/pickup trucks used to ferry the child to and from soccer practice and the occasional hauling job from the grocery store: yes, YOU are safer from other cars on the road, but the other cars are less safe from you; 4WD is not helpful in the snow except to propel you forward - it doesn't help you stop; the actual cost of your vehicle is approximately $40,000 worth of pollution and environmental costs (waste oil, waste tires, road wear, and disposing of the carcass of your super-heavy vehicle) more than you paid for it, but don't worry, I'll be paying my share of your car's leftover crap when it comes due.
So, from my smug, Prius-owning mouth comes a request: buy smaller cars, or cars that run on biodiesel (not corn-thanol - no energy savings there). You'll be just as safe in a modern, smaller car, as you are in a big-ass SUV, especially when you are only likely to be hit by other small cars.
How sad is that...
Isn't it enough that they will do all kinds of crap to whatever you say in order to smear you once you're actually the nominee? Whichever one of you that is...
Don't give them ammo, don't talk about the other nominee, talk about policy and only policy and make sure you answer the "when did you stop beating your wife?" questions with a simple "irrelevant." When asked about Reverend Wright, please say, what does he have to do with me (or the other person) being President? Rev. Wright is a man with an opinion, not the mouth of God.
Just stop.
And there are the various proposals for gasoline prices this summer. Clinton and McCain have both decided that we could have a gas tax holiday this summer. This would (according to Obama) give us a break worth half a tank of gas for the whole period, while de-funding the roads and highways trust fund for the summer. Wanna buy a bridge in Minneapolis? Many economists and pundits have weighed in, and they've all come to the same conclusion: gas prices are high, and there is very little we can do about it in the short term. And the high prices are a harbinger of bad things to come (food prices are going up in direct proportion of the gas prices going up), but perhaps the high gas prices will finally persuade Americans that the free ride is pretty much over.
To those of you out there riding around in big-ass four-wheel-drive SUVs/pickup trucks used to ferry the child to and from soccer practice and the occasional hauling job from the grocery store: yes, YOU are safer from other cars on the road, but the other cars are less safe from you; 4WD is not helpful in the snow except to propel you forward - it doesn't help you stop; the actual cost of your vehicle is approximately $40,000 worth of pollution and environmental costs (waste oil, waste tires, road wear, and disposing of the carcass of your super-heavy vehicle) more than you paid for it, but don't worry, I'll be paying my share of your car's leftover crap when it comes due.
So, from my smug, Prius-owning mouth comes a request: buy smaller cars, or cars that run on biodiesel (not corn-thanol - no energy savings there). You'll be just as safe in a modern, smaller car, as you are in a big-ass SUV, especially when you are only likely to be hit by other small cars.
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