Politics
« Older Entries | Newer Entries »How I Ended Up Living In Brazil
[ Comments Off ]Posted on January 14, 2011 by admin in Politics
Friday, January 14th, 2011The thing I love most about America’s slow slide into a totalitarian police state is that it means I get to live in one of my favorite 80′s movies.
It’s Amazing How Much I Have In Common With John Boehner
[ Comments Off ]Posted on January 7, 2011 by admin in Politics
Friday, January 7th, 2011I’ve also decided that my ignorance of congressional procedure makes my destiny clear: a career in congress.
 Much like Pete Sessions and Mike Fitzpatrick, I also enjoy swearing at the TV. |
It’s amazing how much I have in common with Republicans, and John Boehner in particular. Regarding both, I’m happy to see Nancy Pelosi leave her position as Speaker of the House. I might be happier if she weren’t still hanging around as Minority Leader, but baby steps, right? Baby steps. Some other things I have in common with Republicans are that I don’t understand the Constitution well enough to read it properly in congress, I love it when people give me money, and I sometimes miss important appointments. Although I feel confident that if I’d just been elected to the house of representatives, I’d at least make it to my swearing in. Unless of course, I was busy raking in cash from supporters, and there was something great on TV. Like my swearing in ceremony, for instance (starring John Boehner), or some drunk, fellow politician crying on TV (also starring John Boehner). Speaking of ol’ John, aside from the fact that spell-check doesn’t suggest “boner” and “bonehead” to replace my last name, I have even more things in common with him in particular, as I mentioned at the outset. Historically I’ve been known to drink quite a bit, although not so much that people set up blogs about it, as in John’s case. This would lead to the occasional public tear in the eye, but again, not so often that people set up blogs about it. I’m also a little ashamed to admit that I still smoke. But at least I don’t smoke crappy brands like his, and promise sick friends I’ll quit if they will. But enough picking on John. Someday I may find myself sitting on the “Boehner Bench”. Another thing I recently discovered that I have in common with politicians is that I like getting paid to talk, even if nothing of benefit to the human race comes of it. After watching an hour of a house session the other day, I was reminded that politicians long ago made this a high art. Once I finally woke up, with drool on my face and a perfect imprint of my computer keyboard on my face, I went on Facebook and shared “I just listened to an hour of live house proceedings and can’t help wondering what makes anybody think the clowns in DC who’ve run our economy into the ground have any idea how to run a vacuum cleaner let alone an entity governing 300 million people”, adding that we’d all take a lot more interest in lawmaking if all legislation was decided by cagefighting matches. There was a lot of agreement on this topic amongst my fellow citizens. A friend chimed in, suggesting “it would have been cool if Nancy Pelosi ran over to Joe Wilson during the State of the Union address and tried to choke slam him”. Unfortunately, politics in America will never be this much fun, as we’ve pointed out before (except maybe when Pelosi hands over the gavel, see below) But in spite of the boring future that may await me, I’ve made a big decision. Given my ignorance of the Constitution and legislative procedure, my dual passions for blowing smoke, and the fact that I like free lunches where people give me money, my destiny is clear. I’m running for the US Senate.
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Fashionable Fear-Mongering: World War III With China
[ Comments Off ]Posted on December 29, 2010 by admin in Politics
Wednesday, December 29th, 2010Now that the TSA’s relentless breast and crotch groping has saved us from the threat of radical Islamic underwear bombers, we can focus on new irrational fears. Like war with China.
 I surrender. |
How’s your Mandarin? Do you like Chinese food? These are good questions, because if you’re tired of the same old fear-mongering about radical Islamic terrorists, we have an even more terrifying thought for you. What if suddenly you couldn’t afford a new cell phone or flat-screen TV because China started restricting their exports of rare earth metals? Now there’s something the average American would go to war over. And the idea of war with China isn’t so preposterous; we’re already at war, and have been for a while now. So far we’ve been just fighting about who’s state-controlled capitalism is better for the world. Their brand, in which they cleverly make the Japanese buy dollars by buying Yen to manipulate currency? Or our brand, in which Ben Bernanke just prints more money to manipulate currency? Some think China is flipping off America with their strategies, while others take a more balanced view, pointing out that we need China to do this. And still others take a longer view and suggest we need to turn this “financial cold war” into a new game of Mutual Assured Destruction, only this time based on economics. But it’s not really just the sanctity of our electronic gadgets or the once almighty dollar we have to worry about, because China’s defense minister said yesterday that China is preparing for armed conflict ‘in every direction’. So what would war with China look like for the US? Pretty grim, according to a RAND study published a few months ago. Not only do they have submarines that can pop out of nowhere and a missile that can take out an aircraft carrier, but if you believe the stats on this page, China has twice as many people fit for military service as there are people in the United States. I’ll just be signing up for that Mandarin class now, so I can welcome our new overlords with a hearty Ni Hao! By the way, if you don’t understand why Ben Bernanke likes the money printing solution, see the video below. Read the rest of this entry »
NoLabels.org – A Reasonable Voice, Or A Party By The Sheeple, For The Sheeple?
[ Comments Off ]Posted on December 13, 2010 by admin in Politics
Monday, December 13th, 2010Is the new political organization “No Labels” a centrist astroturfing operation, a bunch of high-ideal do-nothings, or a genuine voice of reason? Time will tell.
There’s a tasty little morsel of irony in the fact that the politician that said “cynicism is a sorry kind of wisdom” is almost single-handedly responsible for driving mine to new heights. My cynicism, that is, not my wisdom. So it shouldn’t be surprising that my first response when I read about the new political organization No Labels the other day was “Great. Finally a party for people who don’t believe in anything“. Of course, I’ve already sort of got that angle covered with my own political ideas, which over the past few months have included the Donner Party and the Punk Party. But after watching a few of No Labels’ video streams and following up on the spin they’re getting in the news cycle today, I think I may give them a longer look. The general reaction in the media so far seems to be that starting a rational dialog about solutions to the nation’s problems is somehow a preposterous idea. This piece on Slate is essentially a lengthy snark on No Labels’ assumed naivete. Politico is grumbling that there aren’t enough Republicans involved. The Christian Science Monitor is trying to spin up the rumor that it’s just New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s vehicle to the White House in 2012. On salon they’re all up in arms about who’s funding things, as if a political 501(c)(4) ever runs around disclosing their backers. They’ve only raised about a million dollars, by the way, which is chump change in today’s politics. I think the problem we’re witnessing here is that the press is so accustomed to feasting on the Nazi/Socialist slander that drives today’s politics that it collectively can’t handle a little sanity. The only tangible criticism I personally have so far is that they seem to have brazenly ripped off their graphics from a New York artist. Which really only means someone in the media department is probably getting canned, and some not-terribly-original artist in New York will probably get a payoff. So is No Labels just an astroturfing operation? I guess we’ll find out with time, but for the moment I think turning the rhetoric dial below 11 for a while can’t hurt. So far the only red flag for me was Joe Lieberman’s presence, but hell, he’d probably show up at a KKK rally if he thought it would keep him in office. And will No Labels’ message of cooperation get anything done? Who cares. As P.J. O’Rourke said, “The mystery of government is not how Washington works but how to make it stop”.
Best Politician Of 2010
[ 1 Comment ]Posted on December 7, 2010 by admin in Politics
Tuesday, December 7th, 2010Help us pick a winner. We thought we had one in Tom Delay, then he went and got CONVICTED, so this year we’ve opened the contest to international entries. The race is still tight with Gaddafi and Kim Jong giving Obama and Lieberman a real run for the money.
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This is only the second year we’ve selected a “politician of the year”, so we haven’t sorted out all of the ground rules yet, but we assumed one rule would be that the same politician couldn’t win two years in a row. So Joe Lieberman and Barack Obama were originally not nominees, since they shared the award last year. Well, we’ve reconsidered. Since Obama keeps acting more like Bush than Bush did without even having Dick Cheney around to goad him on, and since an Australian hacker provided more transparency in government in one weekend than Obama has in almost two years, Obama’s back in. And Joe Lieberman’s sudden decision to appoint himself Lord Master of the Internet means he’s back in the running too. We thought we had a sure winner with Tom Delay; his gallivanting around on “Dancing With The Stars” while awaiting sentencing on money laundering charges was the most politician-like behavior we’ve seen since John Edwards got caught whoring around while his wife was dying of cancer. But then Delay went and got convicted, breaking the most basic rule of politics: Break any law you want if it means winning, just don’t get caught. So in the end, we decided we were limiting ourselves by only considering American politicians for the award. It’s like reaching into the same basket of moderately rotten apples hoping for a really wormy one and always being disappointed. This year, the award is going international, and we’re open to suggestions. We’ve presented some candidates below to get you thinking.
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