April 28, 2005

Even Bloggers Get a Vacation

Tonight is my last post for a good week or more. I am going to Jamaica, to a small, secluded, boutique hotel by the ocean. Don’t you envy me? I mean, really. While you are sitting at your computer, putting up with your annoying coworkers, I’ll be lounging by the sea, sipping mojitos and worrying about . . . nothing.

I will be out of the news-loop for a week, so my next post will probably have nothing to do with how terrible W is or my latest beef with Republicans. On the upside, the place I’m staying is always crawling with New Yorkers, and God love them, they sure know how to misbehave. So I will keep a travel diary of my journey and I hope to report back with amusing stories of people behaving badly in the Caribbean.

April 27, 2005

Lucy Always Pulls the Ball Away

The other day, I was complaining to Ironhuff about the behavior of a friend. He said the best thing I’ve heard in a while. “It’s like Charlie Brown. He thinks that this time Lucy won’t pull the ball away and will let him kick, but she never does. Lucy always pulls the ball away.” I know too many people like that. On the political level, you could say the American public is Lucy. In the 2004 election, they pulled the ball away.

Take a certain pop star who has undergone massive plastic surgery. Put a five-year old in his sprawling mansion and next thing you know, that five-year old is sitting on the witness stand and CSPAN is having a circus. Or Senate majority leaders, especially Republican ones. They always end up resigning over some jackass thing they did (give the current one time).

The media is one big Lucy. They are still talking about the Pope. And they’ll be talking about him next week. They overdo everything: it’s their signature pulling that ball away.

When people are predictable, it’s usually for the worse. Everyone knows the stereotypes. Like the friend who is always getting fired. They’ll tell you it’s never their fault, but how can every company that person has worked for been wrong? Or the pal who is always needing money – and he is well into adulthood? He’ll tell you it is never his fault, that life happens and he is always in debt and the light bill is always two seconds away from being turned off. Meanwhile, said friend is driving a nice car, wearing nice clothes and going out every night. Then there’s always the person who can’t find love, because even though she isn’t much more attractive than a boiled chickpea, she has to haves someone with the looks of George Clooney, except George Clooney is too old looking for her.

I’m struck lately by the number of people I encounter on a daily basis who have something in their lives chronically messed up: finances, career, love, health, or all four and more. Bad junk happens to good people. Those aren’t the folks I’m talking about. We’re talking the repeat offenders. The ones that crap happens to all the damn time – the same ones who will tell you it is never their fault.

You know a few of these folks, admit it. Vegas if full of them. San Francisco, my home before Vegas, is not so polluted with this particular ilk (though for some reason, they have a large number of child molesters, so go figure). People I know in SF have careers, work on their health, try to improve themselves. In Vegas, I’m met more good folks than bad, but good God, have I met some losers in this town. And the one thing that strikes me about them is that not a single one of them is ever willing to say, “you know what? My life is screwed up and it’s my own damn fault. Maybe I shouldn’t have had a kid at 18 and married that two-timing mobster only to be divorced at 19 and penniless with a screaming child attached to my hip.” Or, “Maybe I shouldn’t have called my boss a dyke. That might be why I got fired.” Or, “I shouldn’t have taken out a loan on my house and gambled it all away at the Stardust.” How about, “If I hadn’t smoked for twenty years, perhaps I would not have lung cancer.” And finally, “I bet if I stopped eating fast food daily, I might lose some weight.”

What’s my point? I dunno, I’m a repeat offender at rambling. That’s my version of Lucy pulling that ball away. All I know is that the older I get, the more I encounter people behaving badly as a matter of habit. You want to give them a second chance. You want to believe that they will take responsibility for their bad behavior – this time. But no. They pull that damn ball away.

So if you are thinking of doing a favor for one of these people, take if from Charlie Brown. You are gonna end up on your ass, muttering “good grief.”

April 24, 2005

Spain: the New West Hollywood

Spain’s lower house of Parliament has given homosexuals the A OK to marry and adopt screaming brats. Damn! That country is more Catholic than your local St. Mary’s, yet they manage to do something progressive. Meanwhile, US Democrats are digging in their heels and saying no to God-Squading conservatives who want to put scary judges on the bench and turn us all into cookie-cutter Christians.

Thinking about this makes me miss the Seventies. We were more like the Spanish back then, a more liberal, open nation. Carter was in office, and yes, the country was in a recession, but both rock and roll and disco were thriving and punk was just emerging on the scenes. People were dancing machines, whether it was the hustle or moshing. Hair was long (on guys), women were talking liberation and equal rights, and everyone was drinking crappy wine with screw tops. Sure, we had bad taste, but we were so much more fun back then. We had fun the way, say, the Spanish are notorious for having a good time.

America, try to be more Spanish and get over the gay thing. They are queer and they are here. And if we can’t do that, let’s at least have a full-out push to return to the true good old days where everyone was easy-going because we were polluted in one form or another.

Frist Needs to Party

Quick, someone give Senator Bill Frist a mojito because this dude needs a cocktail something bad. You know the story: he wants to put some bible-thumping judges on the federal bench. Democrats contend that the judges are extremists whose legal decisions are based more on conservative ideology than legal merits. They’ve made it clear that they will filibuster the nominations. Frist, a typical get-ouf-of-my-sandbox Republican, has said he would respond by moving to change the filibuster rules to the simple majority standard.

What is this kind of attitude gaining him? A good chunk of nada. GOP polling compiled by the Winston Group and presented late last week to Senate staffers showed that 51% of registered voters opposed the idea of changing the rules — compared with 37% who backed it.

Frist. DeLay. W. Cheney. Rummie. What a bad-boy gang of spoiled brats the Republicans have weaved. Thanks, GOP, for making Democrats look good. We need the positive image for a change.

April 23, 2005

Thinking Like Rove

Finally! The Democrats are starting to think like Karl Rove. There is a God, and, yes Virginia, he is a liberal. The dems are coming out of the closet and declaring that the energy bill the house passed on Thursday will raise gasoline prices and subsidize oil companies, but fail to reduce the country's dependence on foreign oil. If that doesn’t get the red states’ attention, then they really are good for nothing but flying over.

The sounding call came from Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass who said in Dem’s weekly radio address: "We cannot afford to continue to pursue such a failed energy policy. If we fail to reduce our dependence on Opec oil, we remain beholden to events in dangerous, unstable parts of the world. ... If we fail to reduce the cost of energy, businesses will suffer.”

I’m dead serious with what I’m about to say: the tone of his address is classic Rove. Scare the bejeez out of everyone. Paint a picture of a doomed world where Muslims rule us. Thank you, God. Thank you Rep. Markey. Now you dems are starting to get the picture. Win votes by fear. W did and look at how good it worked for him in the last election.

April 21, 2005

Holy Water or Big Water Stain?

I’ve been in LA, living amongst the beautiful people and searching for stars but just finding tourists. When I returned to the real world (if you can call Vegas the real world, which you can’t) I learned that we have a new pope, Bush is trying to give another Jackass a job, and that Mary, as in the Big J’s Mom, is making a special appearance on an underpass in Chicago.

You know, I don’t mean to be skeptical, but if this apparition is the real thing, shouldn’t she have picked a place a little more dignified? Show me a water stain on a wall at the nearest Prada store and I’m a believer. There’s something logical about the God of handbags and the Mother of the God of Mankind appearing in the same venue. Oh there I go again, with the blasphemy. I can’t help it. I lead a small life and I love to make fun of people who get inspired by water stains on an underpass.

I once wrote a short story about a child who was spooked by the wood knots in her grandpa’s walking cane. They looked evil to her. That story got rejected everywhere. What a dumbass I was. I should have changed the story so that the cane held the likeness of Mary, and bam, the AP would have picked me up, fiction or no fiction. It’s all the same these days.

April 10, 2005

Can You Put That Baby Out?

Why can’t we have no-baby sections on planes and in restaurants? They do that for cigarettes and I’d argue that babies are just as annoying (like cigarettes, they smell bad) and they are also bad for your health (people are always getting colds from being around wheezing, sneezing babies).

I have to fly to LA on Tuesday, and because I am opposed to babies in general, I always end up sitting right next to a zoned-out mom and her screaming, squirming, dough-bag of poo. Wow. I sound like a child-hater. I must be a democrat.

DeLay: The Latest Poster Child of People Behaving Badly

This mission of this blog is to post about people behaving badly. That’s why I never mention Jimmy Carter. It is also why W gets so much attention here. He’s got 666 stamped in ultraviolet on his forehead, just most Americans think denial is only a river, or they are benefiting from his tax break and don’t give a hoot. If you voted for W, I’m sure your karma is going to catch up with you – it will if there actually is a God. It’s already caught up with one of the most ill-behaved people in the Republican party, Mr. Tom DeLay .


Isn’t life grand when bad people get their due? Now if only journalists would do their part and start reporting on the kind of job our president is really doing, then life would be complete. And if all my republican friends (you three know who you are) would start listening to me, then there actually would be a heaven on earth.

April 09, 2005

Gangsta Rap W Style

The 90s gave us presidential sex scandals, Jennifer Aniston’s hair, dotcom rich kids and, and best of all, a decrease in gang violence. Those days are over, perhaps most profoundly for the latter. Gang-related homicides are up 50 percent. According to the Justice Department, there are about 21,500 gangs nationwide with over 730,000 members, in red state cities like Salt Lake, as well as the old standards, New York, LA and Philly. In response, W has proposed to cut nearly a billion dollars from programs designed to help anti-gang programs. Over the next few days, House and Senate negotiators will try to come to agreement on their budgets. W’s budget proposal would cut over $400 million from education and family-support programs, which hopefully keep kids away from gangs (and where they really belong: with their dysfunctional parents). It also eliminates $54 million in Juvenile Accountability Block Grants, and reduces almost 90,000 police officers.

Arianna Huffington’s latest blog has a great story on this subject, but to add a La Blogda spin, here’s the deal: W wants us to know that he is big on family values. But it would appear that is true only as long as those families are upper class Republicans. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. If you are lower middle-class and you voted for W, you are too poor to be a Republican, especially a neo-con Republican. So get your head out of your bible and get serious about 2008. Send those zealot conservative packing and straight into therapy, which is what they really need.

April 08, 2005

I'll Take One Resignation and a Liberal to go, Please

The media has barely touched on the fact that DeLay pulled his father off life support years ago. This is the same man who denounced Schiavo’s husband, as well as judges, for committing “an act of barbarism,” for removing her tubes. The LA Times practically turned poetic in their article on DeLay’s family matter. Of course, what happened to DeLay’s father was sad and tragic, and devastating for the family. What’s also sad is that DeLay’s hypocrisy in the Schiavo case has met the press with nothing more than a disgruntled murmur.

In response to DeLay’s comments, W said he will "continue to put judges on the bench who strictly and faithfully interpret the Constitution." He hasn’t done it yet, so why should we believe him. Of course, the media won't dig any deeper into that comment and the story ends here. Unless, of course, DeLay resigns and W puts a liberal on the bench.

Shhh! No Talking in the Friendly Skies

In a poll conducted by the National Consumers League and a flight attendant’s association, 69% of air travelers won’t you to keep your cell phone turned off.


This means that you will not be able to coo at your baby over the phone in flight, have a fight with your significant other, bug your secretary who is relieved that you are out of the office or catch up with your friends about how drunk you got last night. Who said flying isn’t civil.

Next Up, Another Story on the Pope

Lots of inane things make the news like this and this. Meanwhile, the media is letting slip truly valuable stories, such as the W administration's faux press or the government’s negligence to make alternative fuel sources a viable reality.

If I’m sounding like a crazy person, blame it on the last 4.4 years.

Does W and his gang have the media so scared that they can’t do hard news anymore? What the heck is hard news these days anyway? Covering a severed finger in fast food chili?

When did the media stop reporting and just turn into ordinary writers? No wonder blogs (not this blog, but real ones) are kicking booty in the press.

April 03, 2005

There Goes My Upgrade to First Class

As usual, I’m late on this story, because I’m a blogger who is more concerned with making fun of people than timely reporting. I’ll rot in hell for that, I’m sure, but in the mean time, here’s a good story that is about five days old. An agency connected with the Bush administration has lied. Shocking! Except the AP won’t use the word “lie,” because they don’t have the cache that only Bush-approved journalist have, meaning, the AP is not connected with gay hooking or gay porn sites like Mr. Gannon/Guckert. So they might get in trouble. Not that Bush-approved journalist would use the word “lie,” either.

I know what you’re thinking, why can’t she get over the Gannon/Guckert thing? Well, to be honest, I’m still not over the fact that I actually know people who voted for Bush to begin with, so you need to give me a little more time (and Prozac) to get over W in charge period.

Enough about me and my anger issues. According to a government investigation, the Transportation Security Administration misled the public about its role in obtaining personal information about 12 million airline passengers to test a new computerized system that screens for terrorists, and, of course, for the next four years, Democrats. I’m just kidding (maybe).

"TSA officials made inaccurate statements regarding these transfers that undermined public trust in the agency," the report said. "These misstatements were apparently not meant to mischaracterize known facts. Instead, they were premised on an incomplete understanding of the underlying facts." In other words, they lied! Just say it, journalists of the mainstream media. A government agency has lied. Liars, Liars, Liars. Now watch me get bumped off my next Delta flight for posting this.

April 01, 2005

One Part Fundamentalist, Two Parts Extremist

The Terri Schiavo protesters and hard-core W groupies have accomplished one thing. They’ve firmly divided the nation between heathens like me and most everyone else, and the religious fanatics. Who are those people, those bible-thumping, hanging-out-with-Jesus folks? I know a few of them and that’s it. There’s Mrs. S (named changed to protect me), this 72 year-old cranky woman who wears God on her sleeve and hates everyone because they aren’t pious. When you say hello to her whenever you walk past each other, she snubs you. Now that’s Christian! Then there’s this chick I know who doesn’t believe in abortions, yet keeps having kids she can’t support financially and leaves them with relatives for years on end. Then there is this cheeseburger-of-a-guy who loves the Lord but hates the homos.


There really the only ones I know personally. But to hear the media, to see the protesters outside the Schiavo hospice earlier this week, I have come to two conclusions: 1) I must lead a sheltered life and 2) take away the violent acts and you have little difference between Islamic extremist and Christian fundamentalists. So, on the off chance that you fall in one of those two categories, listen up jackass, here’s some things you need to hear: A) Don’t take the Bible so literally; B) Your way is not the only way, nor necessarily the right way. Most hard-core religious people make colossal mistakes that cause them to end up on Jerry Springer or the Surreal World; C) Please, for God’s sake, have a cocktail and lighten up; D) Get some therapy, and finally; E) stop trying to change the world. You are doing a really, really bad job.

Give me a glass of Phantom Hill Pinot Noir. I feel sobriety coming on.