Heh

OK... in the "better late than never" category...



Well, not to quibble, but weren't their lives empty BEFORE the election?

Why I'm Voting Democrat...

Via Lex… especially for Blog-Buds Barry and Doc… a letter to the editor, published at American Thinker. Just a couple of excerpts to whet your appetite (I’m sorely tempted to use a Guns ‘n’ Roses pun here, but I’ll resist):

I’m voting Democrat because like most Americans I trust lawyers more than anyone else; I think only lawyers should run the government, and all the Democrat Leaders are lawyers: Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, Joe Biden, John Edwards, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Leader Harry Reid, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry, to name just a few. (Al Gore dropped out of Law School, so I don’t trust him as much, except on Global Warming.)



I’m voting Democrat because the Democrats support the trial lawyers and I think this country needs more lawsuits and less tort reform. And I don’t believe the trial lawyers’ contributions have a thing to do with it.



I’m voting Democrat because Congress has done such a wonderful job under Democrat leadership the last two years, that I want a lot more of the same.



I’m voting Democrat because I want to get my health care from the same competent, efficient, cost-effective, customer-service-focused folks who run the US Post Office, the Pentagon, FEMA and the state Registry of Motor Vehicles.

[…]

I’m voting Democrat because I’m for putting up barriers to free trade, as they did in 1930 with the Smoot-Hawley bill. That made things much better then.

I thought about adding more excerpts… but you get the picture. And you should go read ALL the great reasons for voting for The One… and his partners-in-crime running for House and Senate seats, too. I mean… how could you NOT, based on the way they’ve run things over the past two years? (Which, of course, in no way makes up for the debacle of the previous SIX years of a GOP-controlled Congress… but those retards were voted out in 2006, right?)

On Joe

So… like many others around the Right-O-Sphere and elsewhere I’m simply appalled at the way the Left-O-Sphere and the MSM have slimed Joe Wurzelbacher, aka “Joe the Plumber.” Jeez… the sheer temerity of this guy, questioning The One, and worse yet… disagreeing with him. You can’t DO that… this is a Brave NEW America! About which, a short video from Fox News Channel:

Regarding that “elsewhere” link, above. This is an excerpt from that link (Jules Crittenden, writing on his blog):

Now they’re investigating the “I am Joe” crowd. CBS:

The Republican National Committee is sending around this Associated Press photo of overall-clad McCain supporters standing outside an Obama rally, clutching plungers and a sign proclaiming “I Am Joe The Plumber”:

The only problem? At least two of the members aren’t quite as similar to the newly famous Joe Wurzelbacher as they might like you to think. As CBS News’ Maria Gavrilovic, who is traveling with the Obama campaign, reports, the man on the right does say he’s an actual plumber – though he is from Melbourne, Australia, and will thus not be casting a vote this November.

And the man on the left, plunger thrust high in the air, is Charlie Smith – the National Chairman of the College Republicans.

Yeah, well maybe it isn’t that they actually are Joe, but that they’re expressing an affinity with Joeness, you morons. Hard to grasp, I know, after all the energy that’s been put into explaining how sitting on boards with people, kicking off campaigns in their living rooms, sitting in their pews for 20 years, doesn’t make you an America-hating, ex-terrorist-palsing bigot or give you any affinity for them.

There’s much more, and here’s the link again. You should go read, if you haven’t already.

Further: Here’s David Burge (aka Iowahawk) on the subject, deviating from his usual and inimitable satirical take on things political:

First, a pre-emptive apology for the intentional non-humor to follow. I promise that all future non-humor will be strictly unintentional.

We've all witnessed a lot of insanity in American politics over the last few years. Up until the last few days, none of it has seriously bothered me; hey, just more grist for the satire mill. But after witnessing the media's blitzkreig on Joe 'the Plumber' Wurzelbacher, I can only muster anger, and no small amount of fear.

Politicians -- Sarah Palin, Bill Clinton, et al. -- obviously have to put up with some rude, nasty shit, but it's right there in the jobs description. Joe the Plumber is different. He was a guy tossing a football with his kid in the front yard of his $125,000 house when a politician picked him out as a prop for a 30 second newsbite for the cable news cameras. Joe simply had the temerity to speak truth (or, if you prefer, an uninformed opinion) to power, for which the politico-media axis apparently determined that he must be humiliated, harassed, smashed, destroyed. The viciousness and glee with which they set about the task ought to concern anyone who still cares about citizen participation, and freedom of speech, and all that old crap they taught in Civics class before politics turned into Narrative Deathrace 3000, and Web 2.0 turned into Berlin 1932.0.

Godwin's Law! you say? if the jackboot fits, wear it.

If it's meta-memes and meta-meta-narratives these media headlice want, so be it. I hope you will join me in expressing a simple bit of solidarity with this guy, Spartacus style. I AM JOE. I am a Wal Mart schlub in flyover country who changes my own oil and unclogs drains without a license. I smoke and drink beer and toss the football in the front yard with my kid, and I figure I can fend my way without handouts from some Magic Messiah's candy bags. Most everyone in my family and most everyone I grew up with is another Joe, and if you screw with them, you screw with me.

Are you a Joe? Say it proud. Leave it on every goddamn newspaper comment section and online forum. Let these pressroom and online thugs know you won't stay silent when they try to destroy the life of a private citizen for speaking his mind -- because for every one of them, there are a million Joe Wurzelbachers. And for that we should all be thankful.

Dang. What he SAID! Mr. Burge also included a link to the graphic displayed at the top of this post… suitable for insertion in your sidebar, if you have a blog. I’m just gonna include it here… coz my sidebar leaves NO doubt as to who I support and what I think of The One… and his policies. With any luck this whole “Joe” flap might be the event that allows Senator McCain to turn the corner. One can always hope…

And now… it’s Saturday, so it’s All Football, All The Time. For the rest of the day and well into the night.

I Didn't Watch the WHOLE Thing...

... so I might have missed this particular night. I'm pretty sure this wasn't the program at Invesco Field, but in the convention center? Possible, if not entirely probable.

2008 Democrat National Convention

Schedule of Events

7:00 pm OPENING FLAG BURNING

7:15 pm PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE TO THE U.N.

7:20 pm Ted Kennedy PROPOSES A TOAST

7:25 pm NONRELIGIOUS PRAYER AND WORSHIP - Jesse Jackson & Al Sharpton

7:45 pm CEREMONIAL TREE HUGGING - Darryl Hannah

7:55 pm Ted Kennedy PROPOSES A TOAST

8:00 pm HOW I INVENTED THE INTERNET - Al Gore

8:35 pm Ted Kennedy PROPOSES A TOAST

8:40 pm OUR TROOPS ARE WAR CRIMINALS - John Kerry

9.00 pm MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR SADDAM AND HIS SONS - Cindy Sheehan and Susan Sarandon

10:00 pm ANSWERING MACHINE ETIQUETTE - Alec Baldwin

11:00 pm Ted Kennedy PROPOSES A TOAST

11:05 pm COLLECTION FOR THE OSAMA BIN LADEN KIDNEY TRANSPLANT FUND - Barbara Streisand

11:15 pm FREE THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS FROM GUANTANAMO BAY - Sean Penn

11:30 pm OVAL OFFICE AFFAIRS - William Jefferson Clinton

11:45 pm Ted Kennedy PROPOSES A TOAST

11:50 pm HOW GEORGE BUSH BROUGHT DOWN THE WORLD TRADE TOWERS - Howard Dean

12:15 am TRUTH IN BROADCASTING AWARD - Presented to Dan Rather by Michael Moore

12:25 am Ted Kennedy PROPOSES A TOAST

12:30 am SATELLITE ADDRESS - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

12:45 am NOMINATION OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA - Nancy Pelosi

1:00 am Ted Kennedy PROPOSES A TOAST

1:05 am CORONATION OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA

1:30 am Ted Kennedy PROPOSES A TOAST

1:35 am Bill Clinton asks Ted Kennedy to drive Hilary home

Via e-mail, from The Usual Suspect.

A Brief Introduction...

... to David Burge's latest masterpiece:

The Idiossey

The Not-Really-That-Epic Poem of Obamacles

(with Apologies to Homer)

Book the First: A question for the Muse

Speak to me, O Muse, of this resourceful man
who strides so boldly upon the golden shrine at Invescos,
Between Ionic plywood columns, to the kleig light altar.
Fair Obamacles, favored of the gods, ascends to Olympus
Amidst lusty tributes and the strumming lyres of Media;
Their mounted skyboxes echo with the singing of his name
While Olbermos and Mattheus in their greasy togas wrassle
For first honor of basking in their hero's reflected glory.
Who is this man, so bronzed in countenance,
So skilled of TelePropter, clean and articulate
whose ears like a stately urn's protrude?
So now, daughter of Zeus, tell us his story.
And just the Cliff Notes if you don't mind,
We don't have all day.

Said the Muse:

I will tell the story of Obamacles through my scribe Iowahawk.
But this shit is copyrighted, so reproduce at your peril.

Fair Use, David... Fair Use.

Targets

Via memeorandum (No Quarter)… THE best Obama satirical site yet: “Best Obama Facts.” And Hoo-Boy, is it ever filled with chunky goodness! A sampling:

Best Heroic Truths About Obama

1. Every now and then, Obama opens his eyes and the world springs into existence.

2. When a tree falls in the forest, Obama hears it.

3. Obama can clap with one hand.

[…]

8. "Obama" is the very first word in the English language to be a verb, adjective, noun, pronoun, adverb, interjection, superlative and pronad. (Pronad is a new category made specifically for the word "Obama" so its power can be fully realized).

[…]

18. Obama always overpays his taxes because he believes that the government will find a better use for his money than he ever could.

19. When Obama rids the world of nuclear weapons, the red button in his office will control the thermostats in American homes.

[…]

44. Obama smokes so you don't have to.

45. Obama's cigarettes have been registered at the EPA as a renewable power source contributing 5,000 Megawatts of electricity to the national power grid every time he takes a draw.

Obama and the Downtrodden

[…]

2. Obama owns an expensive Sleep Number Bed but sleeps on an off-brand mattress in the corner in order to be down with the masses.

[…]

7. Obama once had a chance to save 10% on car insurance by switching to Geico but he said "no" because that would mean a sellout to corporate interests.

And you know there’s more… including some fine Photoshop work!

―:☺:―

Now this is way-cool: “Laser Gunship Fires; 'Deniable' Strikes Ahead?” Excerpt:

Boeing announced today the first ever test firing of a real-life ray gun that could become US special forces' way to carry out covert strikes with "plausible deniability."

In tests earlier this month at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico, Boeing's Advanced Tactical Laser -- a modified C-130H aircraft -- "fired its high-energy chemical laser through its beam control system. The beam control system acquired a ground target and guided the laser beam to the target, as directed by ATL's battle management system."

[…]

The Advanced Tactical Laser, weighing twelve thousand pounds and mounted in a Hercules transport plane, is intended to give Special Forces Command "ultra-precision strike capability" against a wide range of ground targets. Its power is somewhere in the hundred-kilowatt range.

According to the developers, the accuracy of this weapon is little short of supernatural. They claim that the pinpoint precision can make it lethal or non-lethal at will. For example, they say it can either destroy a vehicle completely, or just damage the tires to immobilize it.

Much more at the link… including Boeing’s claim that the new laser would allow Special Operators to conduct strikes with “plausible deniability.” About which, the author of the linked article seems to think is a bad thing. Not me… I love plausible deniability, coz it has definite advantages. I can see Dana Perino (or her replacement, sometime next year) at the podium saying “It wasn’t US, ya know. It musta been someone else. We weren’t anywhere NEAR the place where that limousine carrying Putin blew up. Next question?”

―:☺:―

That article on the advanced tactical laser brings to mind an old joke…

Q: What’s the difference between mechanical engineers and civil engineers?

A: Mechanical engineers build weapons; civil engineers build targets.

Badda-da-boomp!

Here and There

Kathleen Parker’s column at TownHall.com is VERY good today… and VERY funny. Titled “Vlad, You’ve got mail,” the column consists solely of three letters (e-mails?) to Putin from Dubya, The Obamanon, and John McCain. Ms. Parker has adopted the stylistic phrasing and mannerisms of the respective men, and herewith a couple of excerpts:

From President George W. Bush:

Dear Vlad:

Beijing is weird. First of all, you can't breathe the air. Second, how 'bout those drummers? Sure, they're perfect, but that's the point. A billion Chinese see 2,000 drummers in sync and say, "Well done, my little emperor son." I see 2,000 drummers all moving with one motion and I'm thinking: "Whoa." Can anybody say MIL-I-TAR-Y PRE-CI-SION?

Hey, which reminds me. What's up with Georgia? This is not good, Vlad. You and I have had our moments. And, OK, fine, your dog's bigger than mine. A lot bigger. Stronger and faster, too. We got it. But you can't just go invading democratically elected countries that are U.S. allies. You can't have everything, Vlad. If you don't stop, I'm going to have to do something and you know I don't want that. What I want is for you to not make me look like a fool.

[…]

From Sen. Barack Obama:

Dear (Former) President Putin:

I'm sorry to be writing this e-mail instead of meeting you in person, preferably in the Oval Office, where I belong. Soon, soon.

Nevertheless, and notwithstanding the foregoing, I felt it imperative that I express my deep concern about Russia's invasion of the tiny, democratically elected sovereign nation of Georgia. It would appear that you are not familiar with my platform for change and hope. War does not fit into this template and I am quite frankly at a loss for words to express my deep, deep distress.

[…]

Please picture me looking very serious when I say that I respectfully request you to calm down. Life is but a flicker in time and we're but actors strutting and fretting. That is to say, we're all on this planetary journey together and our karma is interrelated and interdependent. Thus, it would seem that our differences are best resolved through words, not bombs.

It is said that war is a failure of diplomacy. I would submit that it is also counterintuitive. If my Kenyan father and my Kansan mother and my multinational upbringing taught me anything, it is that we are all One. That said, I am The One the world has been waiting for -- and you are, quite frankly, blocking my chi.

I won’t give away the whole point of the column by posting McCain’s letter… which consists of only nine words… so there’s simply NO way to excerpt it and preserve the point. You just gotta go read it!

―:☺:―

I had a follow-up with Dr. Thompson (my dentist) yesterday and I’m going to have some additional artificial bone material added to my collection at the end of this month. There’s nothing abnormal or wrong in play here, just a bit of augmentation to the work previously done. This next procedure won’t be quite the production the last event was… just an incision in my gums that will be closed with a couple of sutures after the additional bone is added. And this impending procedure only requires a local anesthetic… no World Class Drugs this time, although that is an option. I declined when offered, but this morning I’m thinking “Wow. Those were some GREAT drugs. Maybe I shouldn’t have turned ‘em down!” (Jes kiddin’, Gentle Reader, jes kiddin’!) (Sorta)

―:☺:―

Michael Phelps celebrates his victory with a world record time of 1:54.80 in the men's 200-meter individual medley final at the US Olympic swimming trials in Omaha, Neb., Friday, July 4, 2008. (AP Photo)

I’ve often said I have an immediate grasp of the obvious… and that’s not a bad quality to have. So, it’s in that spirit that I’m offering the observation that Michael Phelps is THE story of the 2008 Olympiad, so far. The man has just been freakin’ awesome, in the fullest sense of the word. Or, as Joe Posnanski of The Kansas City Star puts it… “Phelps making the perfect look routine”:

The English language is running out of words to describe just how good Michael Phelps is at this swimming thing. Today (Tuesday night in Kansas City), he swam the 200 butterfly in 1 minute, 52.03 seconds, a world record, his fourth gold medal of this Games, the record-setting 10th gold medal of his Olympic career. Four others had won nine golds: Americans Mark Spitz (swimming) and Carl Lewis (track and field), Finland’s Paavo Nurmi (track and field) and the Soviet Union’s Larissa Latynina (gymnastics). That seemed like a good day’s work.

Then there was the relay. Almost precisely one hour later, Phelps led off the remarkable United States 800-meter relay team, which won gold by more than five seconds and blasted the world record by almost that much. Phelps swam the fastest 200-meter split in history (of course) and gave his teammates a 2 1/2 -second lead. This happened barely 10 minutes after he stood on the medal stand to collect his butterfly gold.

So, if you’re counting, Phelps has now won five gold medals at these Games (all in world-record time). He has now won 11 gold medals in his career. That’s two more gold medals, incidentally, than the entire nation of India, which has more than one billion people. He has now won 13 Olympic medals overall, an American record.

Un-bee-leeb-able. And such a joy to watch!

The American women gymnasts, on the other hand, provided the counterpoint to Phelps’ success last night with heart-breaking errors that cost them the team gold medal.

BEIJING — It came down to the last event, the last tumbling pass, the last landing, the last tilt of the head, the last smile.

For the U.S. women's gymnastics team, it came down to a few missteps, and, as is usually the case in a sport of precision and grace, those stumbles made all the difference.

The U.S. lost the gold medal to China 188.9 to 186.525. Simple but glaring mistakes were the Americans' undoing. They may have had prettier routines, but the Chinese were more consistent

[…]

It wasn't close.

Four years of training came down to the floor exercise, an event which the U.S. usually dominates with its high-flying routines and rhythmic dance moves. But all three Americans stepped out of bounds. Somehow, they could not do what they had done thousands upon thousands of times: Stay inside the white lines.

A silver medal ain’t nothing to sneeze at… but it’s a heartbreaker when you’re expecting gold. These Olympic Games have been supremely entertaining, and I’ve simply been mesmerized… all throughout the night and into the wee smalls, as it were.

(photo credit: Gymnasts – The Seattle Times)

Update: I'll quote an e-mail I received a few minutes ago from Deborah Hendrick: "Buck, the hand can be quicker than the eye. I think you put up a photo of Australian swimmer Eamon Sullivan, instead of Michael Phelps." And she was right... the photo of Sullivan I originally posted has been replaced with one of Phelps. Thanks, Deborah.

It's Over...But It's Just Begun.

Well. The Iowa caucuses are over, Praise the Lord. The Hawkeyes can go back to living normal lives now, away from the glare of the all-seeing eye. Much to their relief, one presumes. As for me… I spent last evening watching the Orange Bowl, which I’m quite sure was much more entertaining and a lot closer, game-wise, than the official kick-off to Election 2008. Things will get progressively more interesting as we move forward from here. But as for the outcome? No big surprises if you were watching the lead-up. But I’ll bet Hillary has quite the hangover today.

The best part of the caucuses? Iowahawk live-blogged the caucus he hosted at his house and didn’t have all that good of a time in doing so. Well, except for the first part of this, perhaps:

8:15 PM: That was weird. I heard the exhaust fan running in the upstairs bathroom so I went up to turn it off. When I opened the door Barack Obama was in there torching a one-hitter. "Hey man, want a hit?" he goes, with a big grin. I'm pretty toasted already so I said no thanks. "That's cool,' he says. Really seems like a nice guy. So then he shakes out some blow on the counter and offers me a line. "No thanks man," I say. "That's cool," he says. "Y'all Chase the Dragon?" he asks, pulling out a spoon, lighter and some rubber tubing. I declined again. I'm not sure how good a president he will be, but he's certainly a lot better house guest than Hillary.

8:31 PM: Shit, talk about a buzzkill. Down in the living room Huckabee has won the GOP caucus and his salvation freakshow is pouring all my beer down the sink (even the good stuff like MGD), shouting "Praise Jesus!" I yell at them to stop, but they crank some godawful Creed song on the stereo and tell me they're going to perform an exorcism on me. The Democrats are screaming in the basement, apparently because they can't decide on a candidate and how to divy up the shit they stole from my garage and liquor cabinet. I'm too high to figure out what to do.

Heh. Read the whole thing here.