Presidential Debate Poll

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After the Presidential debate this Thursday, the press will:
cite the lack of a 10-point swing in Kerry's favor the next day as a clear sign his candidacy is doomed.
interview ten audience members after the debate, and quote the person whose comment can be fitted into the story they wrote the night before.
follow a 30 sec. story on the debate with a report on how two monkeys got into a fight in a zoo yesterday and flung poo at each other, wink wink.
embrace the views of post-debate commentators who will use their mind-link with the American public to tell us why the public just doesn't like Kerry.
carefully research and analyze each candidate's claims, and if one candidate distorts the truth more than the other, courageously tell it how it is.
say: "Both candidates made misstatements and distorted their opponent's position. Hey, did you catch our monkey story?"
run stories implying that Kerry deserves to lose because he's not willing to play dirty enough.
run an editorial titled, "Why does John Kerry want to have sex with Osama bin Laden?" (Wash. Times only)
Current results

Fear the Billionaires

Have you ever seen such a scared baby?

You may have heard of Billionaires for Bush, a parody protest group whose members follow the Bush campaign around, dress in ball gowns and suits, and shouts messages like “Thank you, little working people, for paying our taxes.”

As political commentary, it's too witty and roundabout to influence anyone's opinions, but as political comedy the group is hilarious.

They just released a music video with a catchy song and surprisingly professional production values (link from atrios). It's entertaining.

When in trouble, go to the well

The Republican National Committee, best known for their hit single "I Hide My Love From You in My Bunker," is sending out a mailing to Arkansas and West Virginia stating that, if elected, John Kerry will ban the Bible and allow gay marriage.

This type of political rhetoric is shameful. It infuriates me that the official face of the Republican party would stoop to sending out such a bigoted message. To even imply that the Bible would be banned and gay marriage would sweep the nation if Kerry is elected is absolutely ridiculous. At the last gay agenda meeting, we specifically agreed on rewriting the Bible to require its adherents to have gay sex every other Sunday. How can we do that if we ban the Bible?

As Fred Smoot, chairman of the 193^rd district, said in the sewer cavern where we meet: "These people will do anything the Bible tells them too. All we need is to infiltrate a few major printing houses and we got it made."

Religious conservatives bleat about the "gay agenda" and how legally-recognizing a loving relationship will cause the Earth to split open and for Satan to rise up and make us do evil things, like eat candy corn and wake up without hitting the snooze alarm.

But the truth about what we want is much more harder to argue against. Gay people, as the more enlightened of you know, merely want to eat your children and then use their bones to club your unborn babies.

But where is the photo of the zombie gay man feasting on the flesh of the living? Where is the photo of the Kerry campaign worker holding an expectant mother in a head lock while another campaign worker slams a crowbar in her stomach?

I'll tell you where: in mailings to Georgia and South Carolina, not Arkansas and West Virginia, where they belong. Ed Gillespie, chairman of the RNC, should be ashamed of himself for making these types of politics part of the official message of the Republican party.

(if the image is down, here's the gist of the mailer)

BIBLE: BANNED!
HAND HOLDING: ALLOWED!

Argg! Media Make Me Mad!

Candidate X claims that his opponent "steals babies from their mothers, glues the babies to a giant wheel, and charges parents who want to adopt $100,000 to spin the wheel for a chance to win the baby of their dreams. Or a toaster."

Candidate Y claims that while Candidate X was flashing children in a schoolyard, he was wearing a blue overcoat, when, in fact, the overcoat was turquoise.

The news headline? "Candidate X and Candidate Y both play loose with the truth."

My exaggeration aside, read this article and try to tell me that stupidity under the guise of fair-mindedness isn't at play here.

And if John Kerry has said anywhere near the same number of falsehoods about George W. Bush's words, and with anywhere near the same amount of gall, then this reporter failed to do her job by listing those falsehoods.

Postal Project Update

The wonderful USPS label hack you saw weeks ago on Pancake City has been picked up by Boing Boing. Although it is technically a felony, and his new popularity may bring him some unwanted attention by the authorities, you should still watch the short video that my friend, Carlos Guinerra, made at the post office in Jugtown, PA, if you haven't seen it already.

Even in times of turbulent change, one thing always remains true

It is impossible, absolutely impossible, to write a bad monkey story.

Need proof?

Sept. 24, 2004

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (Reuters) - Monkey pooped. The end.

See?

Undecided?

I love writing about politics and much as I love writing comedy. But I know most people don't visit my page for the third rate-political analysis. They come for the second-rate comedy. (And for those of you who thought that joke was predictable: see "second-rate comedy", "previous sentence")

So I'll get back to the jokes soon. But I have a request to make. Is there anyone registered to vote and undecided on who to vote for (or if to vote at all)? If so, are you open to hearing an argument about why one should vote for Kerry?

I can promise not to hound you, to be shrill, and to back up what I say with evidence. I'll even recommend that you vote for President Bush if your beliefs and values aligns closer with his and are also based in fact (see previous post).

If you're interested, please send me an email at monkey(dot)on(dot)keyboard (at) gmail. Thanks.

This started off has a six-line post

The TNR's Noam Scheiber is exactly right with his post on how John Kerry's new focus on Iraq will change media coverage on the war. Kerry's new line of attack against President Bush in the past week has been the best move his campaign has made so far.

I say this for a few reasons. Read Shneiber's post for the first one. The second reason is that there is a gulf between the assumptions of people who support the war in Iraq and those against it. In short, most people who support the war on Iraq hold the false assumptions that Iraq had ties to 9/11 and al Qaeda. Kerry is finally directly contradicting these assumptions. The details are in this awesome study PIPA did a few weeks ago (summary PDF), but here's what to me is the most important part:

Such beliefs are highly correlated with support for the decision to go to war with Iraq. Among those who believed that Iraq had WMD 81% thought going to war was the right decision, and among those who thought it had a major WMD program 49% believed it was the right decision. Among those who thought that Iraq only had some WMD-related activities only 21% thought war was the right decision, and for those who thought there was no such activity just 8% thought it was the right decision.

Likewise, among those who thought Iraq was directly involved in the 9/11 attacks, 73% thought going to war was the right decision, and among those who thought Iraq was giving al Qaeda substantial support 69% thought this was the right decision. But among those who thought there were only a few contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda, 21% thought war was the right decision; and among those who thought there was no relationship at all, only 16% saw war as the right decision.

(page 9)

As I hope you all know, the 9/11 Commission report stated that Iraq had no WMDs or a major WMD-program. It also concluded that there were no substantial ties between Iraq and al Qaeda.

Furthermore, while a shockingly high number of people still hold these incorrect beliefs, the number has declined a bit since their last survey in March, likely due in part at least to the 9/11 Commission report that came out in July. From PIPA:

The percentage saying that Iraq was giving substantial support to al Qaeda has dropped from 57% in March to 50% today. The percentage saying that Iraq had WMDs or a major WMD program has dropped from 60% to 54%.

None of this guarantees that if people realize their rationales for suporting the war are in error, they will reverse their support of the war, punish President Bush for fostering these views and vote for John Kerry. I mean, who can compete with the powerful logic of "Support our Troops!"? But if the Three Stooges of politics, logic, truth, and rationality, can stop running away from mummies long enough to poke the eyes out of even a few hundred thousand Americans, that alone could shift the election towards John Kerry.

And the Kerry campaign knows this. Check out these passages from a speech Kerry gave only days ago:

His two main rationales—weapons of mass destruction and the Al Qaeda/September 11 connection—have been proved false...by the President's own weapons inspectors...and by the 9/11 Commission. Just last week, Secretary of State Powell acknowledged the facts. Only Vice President Cheney still insists that the earth is flat.

(several paragraphs later) We know Iraq played no part in September 11 and had no operational ties to Al Qaeda.

(And, later) Yet today, President Bush tells us that he would do everything all over again, the same way. How can he possibly be serious? Is he really saying that if we knew there were no imminent threat, no weapons of mass destruction, no ties to Al Qaeda, the United States should have invaded Iraq? My answer is no—because a Commander-in-Chief's first responsibility is to make a wise and responsible decision to keep America safe.

What I love about Kerry's new focus is that not only is it hard-hitting and confrontational, it's backed by the truth. Isn't that strange, a biting political attack that's also true? Yes, his strategy is based on at least 50.1% of the American public having the ability to reason and make decisions based on that reasoning. And that's always a risky strategy. But in a democracy, the leaders are no better than the average intelligence of the people who elect them. We will get what we deserve.

The O'Stewart Factor

I'm stealing Wonkette's title. I can't think of a better one.

Jon Stewart appeared on The O'Reilly Factor recently. The interview is hilarious.

I'll Pass On This One

The pet sitting / dog walking company I work for has a web-accesible database with information on each client's pets, how to care for them, and so on. I found this in the file of a client I was considering pet sitting for:

Feed dogs separately. Annie in basement and Abe by the water. Dogs are friendly and playful. Cats may hide under the bed or chair upstairs. Cat carrier is in basement. If cat is deceased, put in towel and put in fridge.

GLORY & THANKS BE TO GOD!

"He Has Restrained Al Gore & His Minions"

I found this archive page on the 2000 election while looking for an election day countdown site. "Only five days left to pray!"

The rest of the site, focused on the current election, is even better. Perhaps you're interested in investigative reporting. In that case, I suggest you check out, "Will Demons Decide the American Election?" Or maybe you are wondering, "Sure, I know the anti-Christ coup is inspired by demons, but are they coordinating it too?" Only one way to find out! And that's to read "Biblical Commentary on Current Issues". Don't be lazy and pass clicking on this link. Sodomite anarchy isn't going to destroy itself!

Cicero for President?

The dates for the Presidential debates are set. The quote in the second paragraph in this WaPo article made me laugh:

Both sides have already begun portraying the opposing candidate as a tremendous debater, as part of the quadrennial ritual of trying to lower expectations for the nominees' performances. Kerry strategist Joe Lockhart told reporters during a conference call Friday that he would "challenge anyone to name a major debate that George Bush has been in where he hasn't been considered the winner."

Matthew Dowd, the Bush-Cheney campaign's chief strategist, said in an interview earlier this month that Kerry "is very formidable, and probably the best debater ever to run for president." "I'm not joking," Dowd added. "I think he's better than Cicero," the ancient Roman orator. "But I think it'll be a very good thing for the American public to see these two men stand side by side. You can't hide who you are."

My New Friends

I've stopped neurotically checking my server logs long ago, but periodically I'll log in to see if any new "citizens" have "moved" into Pancake City or just "stopped by" on the Pancake City Metro so they could "pee" on the "guard rails."

Occasionally, I'll find a link from a respected colleague in the blogosphere that makes the 10 min. of toil and trouble every day worth it. With that in mind, I'd like to give a big Hidey-Ho to my new buddies at:
http://1st-in-costumes.com/Costume-Resources/ fake-breasts-halloween-costume.html .

As any of my long-time readers can tell you, when you're searching for the perfect DD bat-imprint brassiere, there's only one place to go, and that's the mayor's closet of Pancake City.

Best. Political Ad. Ever.

Kerry should suspend campaigning and spend all his money funding media buys for this ad. Even President Bush would vote for him. (Ad on the left. Link from atrios.)

CBS National Guard Documents

You know you have a credibility problem when your News President looks like he has a fake mustache.

Good Morning!

I woke up at 6:00 a.m. to walk a dog. Even with four hours of sleep, I feel energetic. There is something invigorating about hearing the caws of crows echo across the land as the sun warms the underbellies of dark clouds and turns them into a bright orange. Life has given me so much energy now. I feel I can do anything in the world, anything that I--

Zzzz...

(Like you didn't see that coming. I'm taking a nap. I like my cloud underbellies bright white and pre-heated. See you at 1:00 p.m.)

I made an alfredo sauce yesterday and have an extra ¼ cup of heavy cream. Left-over heavy cream is as useful as a third testicle. If you search long enough, you can find a fast food place that will give you some sauce to dip it into, but it really isn't worth your time.

That analogy makes as much sense as a horse drinking water on a motorboat made out of chocolate. The engine is spitting milk, Junior is eating the mast, and no one can find where the horse pooped.

The problem with writing is that it takes effort to make sense. And time and effort don't mix.

But what does mix is this transition sentence, a.k.a. the spoon for the ceramic bowl that is this essay. I don't want to throw away the pampered milk, but my plan to put a packet of sea monkeys in it and donate the cream to a sperm bank didn't make it past their microscopes. Damn you, science! We could have had a new world order.

So I'm forced to do the next best thing: pour it in my roommate's soy milk. That'll teach that lactose-intolerant commie to mess with America. You want to support the terrorists by voting for John Kerry? Fine. America's going to blow a hole through your ass, and she's not going to close the door behind her.

I love mixing stuff.

Bonus info:

Originally, metaphor was a Greek word meaning "transfer". The Greek etymology is from meta, implying "a change" and pherein meaning "to bear, or carry". Thus, the word metaphor itself has a metaphorical meaning in English, "a transfer of meaning from one thing to another".

Amusingly, in modern Greek the word metaphor is used to refer to a cart or trolley; thus visitors to Greek airports will find themselves using metaphors to carry their luggage.

Dess Daglig Försök?

The Daily Show in Sweden? NPR is on the case.

For Those of You Who Doubt There Is a God

Maryland state law requires 10,000 signatures of registered state voters to put a candidate from a new political party on the presidential ballot. Nader's campaign submitted over 15,000 signatures, but only 9,463 of them were valid. Number of signatures short: 537.

Number of votes Gore lost Florida by?

537.

Gee-Mail

My first impression of Gmail, Google's email service currently in a beta test to select Internet cognoscenti like myself, is that it is the third Musketeer in paper, scissors, and rocks. It's fast, well-designed, and comes with a gigabyte of space.

You need an invite to get an account. I got mine by begging a stranger, but Pancake City is a place of dignity, so if you want an account just let me know in the comments. I have six invites, but since this site only has five readers that shouldn't be a problem.

Contest Update Update

Looks like I goofed. My Canadian cousin Erfan didn't win the 9/11 contest. Evan R. did. Evan is currently a grad student living in Brooklyn and is A FULL-BLODDED AMERICAN! U.S.A! U.S.A!

The lesson of this new result is obvious: Canada is populated by a bunch of pussies.

America rocks!

President Bush's Acceptance Speech Excerpts

First Kerry bashing, now Bush bashing. I transcribed parts of President Bush's acceptance speech over the weekend but haven't have time to post them until now.

Tonight we set a new goal: 7 million more affordable homes in the next 10 years, so more American families will be able to open the door and say, "Welcome to my home." Then, they will be able to open their dishwasher and say, "This is my dishwasher." And "This is my cabinet" and "This is my floor. I like to stand on my floor."


We must strengthen Social Security by allowing younger workers to save some of their taxes in a personal account, a nest egg you can call your own and government can never take away.

AL GORE: "Kind of like putting it in a lock box?"
BUSH: "Yes, like--no, no!"


Anyone who wants more details on my agenda can find them online. The web address is not very imaginative, but it's easy to remember: dickcheneyisashemale.com.



Because religious charities provide a safety net of mercy and compassion, our government must never discriminate against them. Unless these charities are trying to marry mercy and compassion, and mercy and compassion are both dudes.


Now, there are some problems with this claim. If you say the heart and soul of America is found in Hollywood, I'm afraid you are not the candidate of conservative values.
ARNOLD [sobbing]: "No-bahdy loves me."


In Afghanistan, terrorists have done everything they can to intimidate people, yet more than 10 million citizens have registered to vote in the October presidential election, a resounding endorsement for democracy. And there are only an estimated 9.8 million eligible voters. I hope our presidential election doesn't suffer from that kind of fraud [wink, wink].


[talking about the decision to go to war against Iraq]

And I faced the kind of decision that comes only to the Oval Office, a decision no president would ask for, but must be prepared to make: Do I forget the lessons of September 11th and take the word of a madman, or do I take action to defend our country?

(August 7, 2001...)
[ring, ring]
BUSH: "Hello?"
BIN LADEN: "Hello Bushie."
BUSH: "Who is this?"
BIN LADEN: "Osama bin Laden."
BUSH: ...
BIN LADEN: "I organized the bombing on the U.S.S. Cole."
BUSH: ...
BIN LADEN: "The World Trade Center bombing?"
BUSH: I know you! You're that guy Clinton told me about. You're a bad guy.
BIN LADEN: A bad guy? Would a bad guy call to let you know that he's not going to commit terrorist attacks ever again?
BUSH: You're not?
BIN LADEN: Nope. I'm hanging up the C4. Shaving the beard. Raiding the harem and heading to Bermuda.
BUSH: That's good. Cause I'm not going to have anything bad happen on my watch. I'm the President.
BIN LADEN: Well, now you have nothing to worry about. Especially not next month. [snicker]
BUSH: "Wait a minute. [Bush removes a pamphlet from a drawer with the title, "National Security Briefing, "Special Edition." He unfolds the pamphlet. Inside is an image of Rumplestilksten, =, and a picture of Osama bin Laden.] I knew it! You're trying to take my baby! And my baby is [Bush looks at opposite page of pamphlet. There is a picture of a baby, =, and a map of America] my gun. You can't have my gun. It's mine. That's why it's my gun.
BIN LADEN: Bushie, come one. You have to trust me. Take my word for it.
BUSH: I don't think so. Aren't you a madman?
BIN LADEN: Well, if you read The New York Times, yes.
BUSH: Laura said never take the word of a madman. Madman, bad man. That's why they rhyme."
BIN LADEN: You know what else rhymes with madman?
BUSH: What?
BIN LADEN: Ice-cream man.
BUSH: But I love ice-cream. You ever try that Buffalo Bill with the bubblegum nose? I like to bite his nose off and say, "Gotcha!"
BIN LADEN: And if you love ice-cream, that means you love me.
BUSH: Does it? [Bush looks at pamphlet, doesn't find anything helpful] Well, tell you what. Cross your fingers, hope to die?
BIN LADEN: Well, I'd prefer if my associates died. But sure, what the heck.
BUSH: Okay. I believe you. But don't even think of double-crossing me, or I'm going to blow up your entire country.
BIN LADEN: [worried] You're going to destroy Afghanistan?
BUSH: No, Iraq. I thought you live in Iraq.
BIN LADEN: No, I live in…yes. I live in Iraq.

9/11 Contest Winner

I finally counted the references to 9/11 in Bush's acceptance speech. He made six references, including one particularly good one where he connects Saddam Hussein to 9/11. The winner: my Canadian cousin Erfan, who guessed eight. That's right: Canadian. I'm absolutely shocked that a Canadian knows more about American politics than we do. Yup. Shocked.

The references are in the comments. Erfan, I'll email your present in a few days. (Canadians have email, right?)

...

On returning home after a visit with my sister, I found that the equivalent of a computer hurricane hit my household. Our DSL connection was wrecked and some computer application I installed wiped out my bookmarks, email settings, and other formerly stalwart programs.

Evidentially, the DSL line stopped working on Saturday, and when my roommate leapt into action (Monday) the service technician told him to reset the router. This is the equivalent of a doctor telling a patient with skin cancer to wash off the sunscreen so he can get a better look at the problem. A fine suggestion, assuming at that point the doctor doesn't give out the window and yell, "sucks!" or the patient realizes sunscreen is good and tries to re-apply it to himself.

In short, I have a lot to post, but it will take me a day to get everything back to normal.

Creative Ways To Protest

A friend of mine did this yesterday. The second half of the video is shot with a hidden camera.

Last Minute Contest

How many time will President Bush refer to Sept. 11th in his nomination acceptance speech tonight? Closest guess gets a prize. You can submit a guess up to tomorrow morning (as awesome as any prize from Pancake City is, I'm sure that the moral fiber of Pancake City readers is so strong that no one will cheat by searching the transcript the next day for "9/11", "September 11th" and "my bestest day ever").

This may be one of those things...

...that only I find funny, but find it funny I did.

From the latest ABC/Wash. Post poll: "Do you think George W. Bush has done more to unite the country, or has done more to divide the country?" (the answer)

Made-up Analogies

Here's a fun game you can play. Make up an analogy and sneak it into conversation like it's a commonplace figure of speech.

Like, "He's one banana short of an airplane" or "She's like Pippi Longstocking without the gauze." If you say the phrase with the right mix of snobbery and aplomb, few will have the courage to call you on your chicanery.

Of course, there is the danger of meeting someone too dumb to hide their dumbness:

"What do you think of the new guy?"
"Jon? Well...nothing."
"What do you mean, 'nothing'?"
"It's just that he seems like the type of guy who likes his ice-cream in a waffle cone, if you know what I mean."
"I don't get it."
"You know. The type of guy who washes his slacks with his underwear."
"You mean he's gay?"
"No! Come on, don't be dense. When he's in the express aisle, he only has 9 items. Got it?"
"So he's a bachelor?"
"Do I need to hire a skywriter and spell it out for you? HE'S THE PRESIDENT OF THE KEVIN BACON FAN CLUB!"
"Are you sure he's not gay?"
"You know, sometimes you're like a beer bottle without the born on date."
"I don't know what that means, but I want an apology."

Baltimore, USA

Gay Street

I don't think this is the message the Bush-Cheney campaign wants to give...

Suck it, Koppel

John Kerry on The Daily Show tonight.

Back from porn, on to politics

"President Bush on Monday criticized a commercial that accused John Kerry of inflating his own Vietnam War record, more than a week after the ad stopped running, and said broadcast attacks by outside groups have no place in the race for the White House."

That's the lead of an AP article and in spirit many others by various news organizations on Bush's comments. Here's the problem: President Bush didn't criticize the Swift Boat commercials. In fact, he said the exact same thing he's been saying for the past few weeks--I condemn all 527s and I hope my opponent joins me in doing so--but used a trick straight out from Rhetoric 101 to make it seem like he was condemning the ad.

When asked to condemn a specific ad (e.g. "Kerry Will Eat Your Baby") he condemned the class of ads (e.g. "227 Ads--Funded By Out-of-Work 227 Actor Florence Johnston") and made it appear that he was condemning the baby-eating ad by saying, "This baby-eating ad is a 227 ad."

Josh Marshall describes this better than I do, and he has a transcript of Bush's comments so you can read it yourself. It doesn't change the fact that a majority of news organizations are reporting Bush condemned the ad when he didn't.

A few things to, um, add. The reason Bush can get away with misleading people is because of his carefully cultivated image as a plain-spoken guy who's not very good at words. Reporters parsed every word out of Clinton's mouth because they viewed him through the paradigm that he is a brilliant politician, a former lawyer, and assumed he had the ability to chose his words carefully so he could either tell the truth technically but not in spirit, or mislead people through language that allowed people to hear what they wanted to hear, not what he said.

And they were right to do so, because Clinton did do all of these things. The problem is that Bush uses the same tricks but he wears cowboy boots and says folksy aphorisms like "I can't say it any plainer" to masterfully cover his use of them up.

It's perhaps the element that is most responsible for his success. His image that almost everyone has bought into is that he's too dumb to be clever. That he has a lot of political skills, but speaking isn't one of them. A man who uses language so clumsily isn't skilled enough to mention 9-11 and Saddam Hussein right after one another so people would think there is a connection. (Search for "Before September the 11th" in this transcript of his 2003 State of the Union address).

This type of plain-spoken man doesn't have the savvy to hold a press conference and say the same thing but juggle his words in a way that gives a lazy media the wrong impression. He can't. He's stupid. And we'd be too smart to fall for it.

Addendum: I like using the word addendum. It makes me feel smart.
Addendum 2: Props to The Washington Post for getting it right.

On the one hand, dog bites. On the other hand, porn.

Today's mail included a free porn periodical addressed to an old roommate of mine. Evidentially, pages 1-25 are supposed to generate in you an increasing amount of horniess, until you get to pages 26-30 and dial 1-900-SUPA-TITS with one hand. (And leave off the last S. That's the S for SEARCH THE FREAKIN INTERNET.)

But how did I know there was a nudie mag in the wrapped package? Because it wasn't completely wrapped. Someone had ripped the top open, and neither of my roommates were home.

There you go. Now you know why the mail arrives late some days.

Do you know what would be fun to to? Sending a fake package with a title like "From your friends at XXXPress!" Then when the mail man sticks his hand in the package, he triggers a device that fires at his palm a blob of glue, a bunch of hair, and a note: "Gotcha! - God."

What's the deal with security companies? I mean, they're security, and they're companies.

Design issues are relevant in every industry, even security. For example, and I direct this comment to the Comotron Security company, there are good fonts to use on a warning sign, and there are bad fonts. Bad fonts include Comic Sans MS. A sign I saw while walking a dog this morning:

WARNING

This house protected by
Comotron Security
Also, this Tuesday at
the Laff Factory:
come see Nutzo and Jelly Bean
Criminals will be prosecuted
As well as those hard-to-open medicine bottles

Misc.

• If New York were invaded by a giant race of ants, and someone looked at the invasion from the top of a skyscraper, it would look just like a lot of ants attacking a lot of other ants.
  "Who's winning?"
  "I'm not sure. Which side has the ray guns?

• One of the dogs I am taking care of over the weekend greeted me this afternoon with a pile of watery poop on the carpet. The one good thing about cleaning a dog's poop (and there is only one good thing) is that it makes other chores a lot easier. Like cleaning the bathroom. "Hey, my roommate didn't poop on the floor. Awesome!"

• You know you're really rich when you can poop like a dog: on the carpet and have someone else pick it up.

The Family Guy

Back in 2005 on FOX. Old episodes shown throughout the year. Props to The Cartoon Network and Kazaa.

Anyone Wanna Buy a F***ing Winnebago?

The Winnebago Man (found on BoingBoing). Warning: contains a few curse words.

The beauty and danger of the American political system is the rigidity of its structure. One of the country's greatest assets isn't the Constitution but the widely-shared belief that the Constitution is a revered document that should be rarely changed.

I find it amazing that in Constitutional law the pre-eminent question is still, "What did the founders intend?" rather than "Is this 217-year-old document still relevant today?" Advertising has created in many of us an almost visceral sense that "new is better," and it applies to everything except the structure of our government. It is the oldest and the shortest written constitution of any government in the world, and this is a source of pride, not embarrassment.

I'm not saying this is bad. Overall, it's been beautiful. The principle of checks and balances, the set-up of the Supreme Court, different term lengths for the House and Senate--they have all worked out well...for the most part.

But the danger inherent in our political system is that it makes long-term thinking, anything over 10 years, undesirable and often politically damaging. Not only because politicians have to run for re-election every six, four, and two years, but the system of checks and balances that serves us so well also makes it hard for a few political figures to "take one for the team", i.e. have enough power to make an unpopular but necessary decision that most people would oppose.

This hasn't been a problem until the past twenty years because we didn't have any looming long-term problems back then. The social security crisis was in its infancy. There was no threat of a worldwide oil shortage (as there is now, although the date ranges from the next five years to the next 50+). But the problem now is that these issues require a much earlier starting point to deal with successfully.

For example, the current system of waiting until the public considers an issue important and lowers the political penalty for acting on it would not give us enough time to respond to an energy crisis. There's no magic alternative fuel waiting in storage that the government or private sector can invest a ton of money into and bring to the market in a few years. My hypothesis is that this would take decades, not years.

And the sacrifice we'll have to pay to support the social security system in a decade is monumental by any account, but much more so if we wait until 2009 rather than 2004. But raising the gas tax by $0.50 a gallon or slashing Social Security benefits, even if absolutely necessary, would be political suicide today. Better to wait until the problem becomes really serious and the need for sacrifice is obvious.

In short, both human nature and our government's structure makes us excel at being retroactive, but horrible at being proactive. The fact that everything has worked out so far isn't because our politicians and our system is flexible to handle whatever issue is thrown at them--they're not--but because this is the first time in U.S. history that we have issues to deal with that the current system is ill-equipped to handle.

The Founders considered a lot, but I think one area they missed is long-term crisis management. We have provisions for immediate crises, like presidential powers for military actions, and succession of power in case of assassination. But how could the men who lived in the land of spacious skies and amber waves of grain predict the scarcity of a resource for a vehicle that wasn't invented for another 100 years? Or a troubled social security system for the elderly at a time when the life expectancy was 35 years?

I don't have a solution. I doubt it's even possible to create a political system that encourages long-term thinking without making sacrifices in other areas (like the balance of power between branches of government). But, then, what is to be done?

Letter to the Ombudsman

Every few months, I write a letter to the WP's Ombudsman about something that they printed (or didn't print). I'm surprised that I usually get a thoughtful response, either from him or the author. If I were Ombudsman, I'd do everything I could to discourage people from writing in so I could take more naps, including calling people "poopy heads." Who are they going to complain to? The Ombudsman?

I sent this one a few minutes ago:

Hi,

I was about to cite the article regarding Cheney criticizing Kerry for saying he would fight a "more sensitive" war on terrorism than Bush as an example of journalism done right. Cheney makes a newsworthy comment, which gets reported. The DNC points out that Bush made almost the same comment to the same group that Kerry spoke to, and it gets printed after Kerry's comment.

Except that when I revisited the article so I could link to it, I noticed it was rewritten. The DNC's point was removed and replaced with a much weaker rebuttal by Kerry's campaign that doesn't include Bush making a very similar point to the same group.

I understand the general principle of valuing a response from "the spokesperson" over "a friend of the spokesperson," but this is just bad judgment. The fact that Cheney criticized Kerry for something that Bush also said in principle is a critical piece of information to this story. I think it should have remained, either in addition to the Kerry campaign's response or in place of it.

On a related note, why does the Washington Post allow politicians to quote phrases from other politicians' speeches without printing the entire section it was quoted from to give the reader some context? Politicians from both sides take each other words out of context. It only takes a few sentences to reprint the original context, or describe the situation behind the comment. It's a non-biased way of letting the reader decide for himself if the attacking politician is honestly representing his opponent's words. Couldn't this be practice be made a policy at the Washington Post?

Sorry to belabor my point about context, but there have been several instances (besides this article) in the past few weeks where my opinion of someone has changed after learning about the context which he or she spoke.

For example, I read a quote from Kerry saying he would have attacked differently than Bush did when he was reading to the children on the morning on 9/11 and was told about the attacks. I thought Kerry said that unprompted and I felt he was taking a cheap shot at the President. While it wasn't the best decision President Bush could have made, it's understandable under the circumstances.

Then I read on a well-known blog on politics that Kerry was responding to a question about what he would have done in Bush's situation, and I no longer thought his comment was unwarranted since he was responding to a question and not making an unprompted attack. It's possible that my memory isn't serving me right, but I don't remember this being mentioned in the original article on Kerry's response. (I've noticed that The Post does include context often, but it is often in a related article a few days after the first one and/or in an "Analysis" piece.)

In general, I think The Post does a great job in reporting, better than most newspapers, but there are still a few areas I think the organization can do even better.

To all my hoes and bitches,
Jason W."

Country Club Vets for Truth

Visual: A man sits cross-legged on a chair, his golf clubs by his side. In the background is a picture of a crazed Bill Murray inserting a stick of dynamite in a groundhog hole.

Al French: "I played golf with George W. Bush."

Bob Elder: "I played golf with George W. Bush."

George Elliott: "George W. Bush has not been honest about what happened in the back 9."

Al French: "He is lying about his scorecard."

Visual: A scorecard with the "1" poorly scribbled out from "174."

Louis Letson: "I know George W. Bush is lying about his scorecard because I was his golfing buddy."

Van O'Dell: "George W. Bush lied about his hole-in-one on the 14^th. He barely got a bogey. I know. I was there. I was his caddy."

Jack Chenoweth: "His account of what happened and what actually happened are the difference between the wait staff and us."

Admiral Hoffman: "George W. Bush has not been honest."

Adrian Lonsdale: "And he lacks the capacity to lead us home at night."

Visual: Inside the clubhouse. The bar is lined with foam-stained glasses. His golfing buddies are all staring at him, angry. Bush has a sheepish smile and is holding his pockets out, which are empty.

Larry Thurlow: "When the chips were down, you could not count on George W. Bush to buy us a round at the 19^th hole."

Bob Elder: "George W. Bush is no Phil Mickelson."

Grant Hibbard: "He betrayed the entire country club ... he lied before our wives, saying he beat us like girlie-men."

Visual: A picture of Hitler, Osama bin Laden, and Evil Gandhi (Gandhi with a handlebar mustache) at a Republican rally, all holding signs that say "We like-a da Bush!"

Shelton White: "George W. Bush betrayed the men and women he played golf with in Piedmont Country Estates."

Joe Ponder: "He dishonored his country club... he most certainly did."

Bob Hildreth: "I played golf with George W. Bush ...

Bob Hildreth (off-camera): George W. Bush cannot be trusted to drive our country club's golf cart."

Announcer: "Country Club Vets for Truth is responsible for the content of this advertisement. Wait, we are? Oh, crap."

Who's the Goss?

Bush nominates Florida Rep. Peter Goss to head the CIA. I don't have any comment or opinion to this. But there's no way I'm passing up an opportunity to add some Danza magic to the blog. That would be worse than passing up free ice-cream. With sprinkles in the shape of Tony Danza's head on it.

WP Headlines

Bush Tax Cuts Scrutinized
Liberal media apologizes, promises to construct time machine, set dial to "Relevant".

NASA Plans for Hubble Fix
Secret documents reveal Hubble to go down in third; Don King professes innocence.

Wal-Mart in Talks to Build D.C. Store
Store to be half the size of city; White House will be moved to lumber aisle.

Unlisted Verizon Numbers Made Public
Verizon apologizes, promises to borrow liberal media's time machine.

Md. Doctors Ask to Go Insurance-Free
Crazy doctors also ride bicycles without helmets, demand whole milk with cappuccinos.

Fox Attack Alarms Va. Community
O'Reilly spotted frosting at mouth; Brit Hume disoriented, dangerous.

Lost Laurel & Hardy Film Is Found
On first viewing, reel pops out of protector, whacks toupee from head of snotty professor.

I Can't Help Myself

This one is too good to pass up (courtesy of Air America Radio).

We'll ignore the fact that John Kerry mixed up "terror" and "anti-terror" in his acceptance speech last week.

Too Scared To Hire?

No one knows why economic growth has slowed down. Job gains in July were 32,000, about 200,000 less than what most analysts predicted. One reason may be that employers feel that the threat of terrorism creates an uncertain business environment and they're delaying hiring people and expanding operations until they feel things settle down.

Wouldn't that be the most awesome check and balance on using the fear of terrorism to get reelected? That you can either heighten the fear people feel, which makes them scared of taking "risks" and change (i.e. a new president), but in doing so you hurt yourself on the other big issue in the election, the economy?

I think the President should star in a new ad campaign designed to encourage businesses to hire more people. The campaign: "Don't Be a Pussy".

That Sleazy Flip-Flopper

The next time someone calls John Kerry a flip-flopper, ask them to do a Google search for Bush and "initially opposed."

Along those lines, this is from an AP article today, "McCain Condemns Ad Criticizing Kerry's Military Service":

"The president thought he got rid of this unregulated soft money when he signed the bipartisan campaign finance reform into law," McClellan said. A chief sponsor of that bill, which Bush initially opposed, was McCain.

It's a good article to read. It shows the fine line McCain has to walk between having integrity and working to re-elect Bush.

Sorry for the bitterness, but sometimes the Bush administration's chutzpah angers me. I know politicians spin issues, dodge hard questions, and try to present the best possible light on things, but can you think of any adminstration, Democrat or Republician, that does the exact opposite of what it says anywhere near the level of this one? Their modus operandi is to construct their own reality solely through rhetoric and repeat the rhetoric until their reality becomes the dominant one (i.e. unchallenged by most of the media and accepted by 50.1% of the public). Facts are inconveniences that can be overcome by convincing people to believe the opposite.

If someone at your workplace fought vigorously against an idea you suggested--protesting it at meetings, working behind the scenes to destroy it--and then, when circumstances forces the company to adopt your idea, says "I supported it all along," what would you think of that person? And why do many people refuse to see President Bush in the same way?

Curse ye, squirrels!

I thought my newspaper wasn't delivered this morning. Nope. I found it when I got home.

Happy Birthday Michele

...

* Beauty is only skin-deep. That's true. Once you get past the skin, it's all mushy and disgusting.

* On the tee vee, there was a story on a restaurant in California that gives free meals to bald people on Wednesdays. One of the women, whose husband is lucky to have her, described his head this way: "He's not bald. It's a solar panel for a love machine."

Will Ferrell Rocks

He did a very funny commercial for ACT.

Why Yes, I Do Love Dogs

While checking my server logs, I saw that someone found the site through I-love-dogs.com. "Huh. I guess I got in their database after one of their spiders scanned a post about my experiences as a dog walker." Not exactly.

Kerry Speech Highlights

• Tonight, we're setting out again. And together, we're going to write the next great chapter of America's story. The chapter: "America Needs a Pooper Scooper."
  
  
• We're told that outsourcing jobs is good for America. We're told that jobs that pay $9,000 less than the jobs that have been lost is the best that we can do. They say this is the best economy that we've ever had. And they say anyone who thinks otherwise is a pessimist. Okay, they didn't actually say all that. But they've been saying so much crazy shit the past four years that who can tell anymore? Check this out. President Bush believes in creationism. Don't know if it's true or not, do ya? See? Crazy shit.
  
  
• And I will build a stronger military. We will add 40,000 active duty troops, not in Iraq, but to strengthen American forces that are now overstretched, overextended and under pressure. Like those in Iraq.
  
  
• We shouldn't be letting 95 percent of our container ships come into our ports without ever being physically inspected. We shouldn't be leaving nuclear and chemical plants without enough protection. And we shouldn't be opening firehouses in Baghdad and shutting them in the United States of America. We should shut them down in both places and send the jobs to China. Ha! Just kidding.
  
  
• We need to make America once again a bacon in the world. I mean, beacon. God, I'm hungry.
  
  
• You see that flag up there? We call her Old Glory, the stars and stripes forever. I fought under that flag, as did so many of those people who were here tonight and all across the country. That flag flew from the gun turret right behind my head and it was shot through and through and tattered, but it never ceased to wave in the wind. Even when the wind wasn't blowing. That's because it was a magic flag. You could even wipe your butt with it and the poop would shake right off.
  
  
• I don't wear my religion on my sleeve. I wear it on my bicep. [tears off shirt to show tattoo of Jesus with electric guitar behind him.] Jesus Rocks.
  
  
• For four years, we've heard a lot of talk about values. But values spoken without actions taken are just slogans. Actions taken without slogans are just values. And slogans that value action but don't act on slogans are empty promises, like the flag hanging in the Oval Office, which looks a lot like a magic flag. But it's not.
  
  
• As president, I will not privatize Social Security. I will not cut benefits. And together, we will make sure that senior citizens never have to cut their pills in half because they can't afford lifesaving medicine. Because then they would die, unless doctors are totally fucking with us and making seniors take more medicine than they need.
  
  
• What does it mean when Deborah Kromins from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, works and she saves all her life, and finds out that her pension has disappeared into thin air and the executive who looted it has bailed out on a golden parachute? Sure, his parachute was actually made out of gold and he plummeted to the ground at 612 mph, but then he landed on a big, soft pile of money.
  
  
• Medicare will negotiate lower drug prices for seniors. And all Americans will be able to buy less expensive prescription drugs from countries like Canada. And France. That right, France. Just to piss Republicans off.
  
  
• So now I'm going to say something that Franklin Roosevelt could never have said in his acceptance speech: Go to johnkerry.com. Also, here's something else that he could never say. I can walk.
  
  
• What if we have a president who believes in science, so we can unleash the wonders of discovery like stem-cell research and treat illness for millions of lives? Yeah, I said it: believes in science. I think he's missing that entire section from his brain. You do too. Even his friends aren't going to call me on that one. Think of how sad that is. He's going to whine to Cheney: "He can't say that. I do believe in séance. You email him to shut up." And Cheney's going to say, "Sure, Mr. President. Right after the magical delivery elf gets back from driving on the Internet." Bush: "Damn that elf! I'm not paying him to cruise around."

Later Today...

Kerry Speech Highlights. I'll write it when I get back from work.

I just realized it's been a week between posts. Wow. I suck.

Dear Democratic National Committee

Please, please, please drop the slogan "Hope is on the way." America isn't trapped in a well.

Down the Drain in the Shower

Every weight-loss advertisement has a few, rail-thin people gushing about the amazing results of the product. "I lost 14 pounds in one week!" Then, on the crawl in small print: "Results may vary."

You think they can go out on a limb and say, "Results will vary"? Or, "If our product actually has this effect on you, please see medical attention. You are about to die." I want to see the weight-loss ad that has a woman saying, "I lost 14 pounds in one week!" and a team of EMTs storming in and strapping her to a gurney. "Dear God! Get this woman into the ICU. Move move move!"

Etymology

You know how the roots of words always match their meanings? Like the word herb, which comes the Latin herba, meaning grass or green blades. Why don't some words have inappropriate histories? Like etiquette, which comes from the Middle French word estiquette, and means "fart from the armpit". Wow. We really screwed that one up.

Brother, Can You Spare a Job?

In their cartoon, "Brother, Can You Spare a Job?", Tom Neely and Greg Saunders have done a superb job of capturing the depression era of the '20s and '30s via old-fashioned cartoon antics and the use of period music.

Okay, that's from their press release. I'm too lazy to come up with my own description. But it's extremely well done and worth watching, even though the message isn't novel.

Real or Fake?

Girls Gone Wild: The Music CD

Enemy of an Enemy, Friend of a Friend

Every day, along one of my dog routes, I walk by a car with a "Bush in 2000" bumper sticker and, next to it, "I Believe In Angels".

Whether the fact that these stickers are still on the car is a testimony to her devotion to President Bush and angels or to the bonding properties of glue, I do not know. I suppose the former, barring an angel tripping her and pushing her down the stairs since she affixed the sticker. Although it is hard to get a good look at the person pushing you down the stairs, and the angel could have taken on a deep voice and said "I'm the devil!" before planting his soft hands into her back.

But that is besides the point. The two slogans made me realize an interesting property of bumper stickers. Multiple bumper stickers can change the response one has to the idea in one of them merely through association with the other. To be specific, I would have rolled my eyes if just the Bush sticker were on her car, or thought nothing if she just had the angel sticker on her car. But with their might combined, now I think she is a dumb ass.

Neither sticker promotes the dumb-assiness of the owner by itself. Rather, the two stickers are taken together as a whole to produce a response too strong for just one of them to create.

My idea is to use this property for political warfare. What we do is put bumper stickers supporting President Bush on our cars and affixed next to it a sticker expressing an idea the Bush campaign would be embarrassed to be associated with. Like "Bush: 2004" and "I Hate Black People!". Or "Support President Bush And Our Troops" with " Nazis Are People Too".

Actually, to save time, we should just find cars with pro-Bush stickers on them. Just to save time. And if anyone wants to be extra clever, why stop at a total of two? "Bush 2004"; "Bush 2008: F*CK The Constitution!"; "Bush 2012: I Now Feel Better About Saying Fuck."

Come On, Get Your Cruise

I suspect advertisers target their ads towards dogs and just replace their names with ours.

"Spot - Reward yourself with new Pepsi Edge"

I realized that the difference between me and the dogs I walk is that when I get really hungry, I can open cupboards.

Landscapers of the Willing

Al Qaeda is the only group taking the coalition of the willing seriously. When President Bush first announced the 46-member coalition, many people mocked it with arrogant, snippy comments such as "some of these countries don't have militaries" and "Ooooh, the Philippines. Thank God for their survey committee." Al Qaeda, on the other hand, is like "We must deal the coalition a mortal blow! Capture a truck driver from the Philippines. Once their 50 humanitarian workers leave, several weeks early, the coalition will crumple like clumps of day-old double-fudge cheesecake with raspberry swirl from The Cheesecake Factory that the lying pigs told you was just made."

I Have a Sneaking Suspicion...

...that there is quite a bit of crossover between these two audiences.

Tonight on The History Channel: Top Ten Plagues

Do you know what's great about the bubonic plague? It's the perfect comedy disease. One, it sounds funny. Two, no one has it anymore, so you don't offend anyone by referencing it. You don't offend someone's mother, or grandfather, or great-grandfather. If you make a bubonic plague joke, no one is going to write you a letter saying:

"You sick bastard. My-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather's uncle's niece's sister, who was raised by baboons and was shunned by the town for her enflamed buttocks during sexual heat, died of the bubonic plague. Or a broken heart. The historical record is fuzzy.

But the point it, she was like a great-great-great-great-great nephew to me. And the pain you caused by rhyming this blight on humanity with 'Da Chronic' can never be repaired.

Shame, shame. Also, Philharmonic Plague would make a great name for a band.

Sincerely,

Phineus P. Fitzgerald"

I'm tired of newspaper articles that argue that the current incivility in national politics isn't all bad relative to the worst moments in U.S. history. Every time there is an article like "Dick Cheney Calls Dick Gephardt Dick Head," next to it will be a companion: "The Nation's First Bitch Slap: Hamilton vs. Burr."

While it is comforting to know we haven't surpassed events like "Senator Coughs During Colleague's Speech, Gets Bayoneted" (1869) or "Rockefeller Socks a Fella" (1912) it's time to raise the bar. If your eight-year-old takes a dump on the carpet, it doesn't help that he also did it at age two and flung it at your mother while singing the Star Spangled Banner. He's eight. He's out of the plastic pants. He should know better.

I feel like this country is in denial. Our politicians act more uncivil and display a Machiavellian worldview through their actions, and our comfort is that at least they didn't write The Prince.

Larger Than Life in Every Sense

Snippets from an article on Marlon Brando's life (July 3, 2004; The Washington Post).

"Mutiny" director Lewis Milestone was one of many directors and studio officials he confounded with his distaste for authority. "Before he would take direction, he would ask why," Milestone said. "Then when the scene was being shot, he put earplugs in so that he couldn't hear my direction."

Starting in the 1960s, Brando became one of the first actor-activists to march for civil and Native American rights. He memorably refused to accept his Oscar for "The Godfather," protesting what he said was discrimination against Native Americans on film and in government policy.

Instead, he dispatched to the Academy Awards a woman who claimed to be a Native American named Sacheen Littlefeather and read an abridged version of Brando's 15-page indictment of policies toward the Indians. Later, she was revealed to be an actress named Maria Cruz, winner of the 1970 Miss American Vampire competition.

"Over time, he represented the disintegration of a sex symbol, as his muscular physique crumbled and he ballooned to more than 300 pounds; he often broke his diets by persuading McDonald's employees to pitch French fries and Big Macs over his fence."

One of his instructors was Adler, who came from a distinguished family of Yiddish actors. One day in class, she asked her students to imitate chickens in a henhouse who had just learned they were about to be hit with an atomic bomb. While others flailed about, Brando sat still and pretended to lay an egg.

A Little Idea

I am disappointed at John Kerry for choosing John Edwards over the best candidate for vice-president. Namely, Lil' Jon. In my haste, I already printed several bumper stickers featuring the duo, including "Big John, Lil' Jon: 2004" and "It's time we put the vice back in vice-president."

Oh, the campaign speeches we're going to miss…

KERRY: "This November, we're going to kick those crooks out of the White House."
LIL' JON: WHAAAAAAT?
KERRY: "We're going to kick those crooks out of the White House."
LIL' JON: WHAAAAAAT?
KERRY: "We're going to kick those crooks out of the White House!"
LIL' JON: "YEAAAAAH!"

In the vice-presidential debates, Lil' Jon could have blinded Cheney with his silver-capped teeth and demanded to be addressed by Jim Lehrer as "The King of Crunk." Sure, Lil' Jon will probably reward his friends and campaign donors with rewritten laws and plum government jobs, but at least you'll know who they are as they'll be with a 10-foot radius of him at all times. Does anyone even have a clue who's in Cheney's entourage? And forget about American unilateralism. Lil' Jon always gives a shout-out to his homies and NATO allies.

Is Lil' Jon perfect? No. Cheney can out-curse him. But in all other areas, Lil' Jon would have been the choice to beat.

...

Tributes to the human spirit are either saving kittens or dying of cancer.

A Few Thoughts

* I enjoyed the thoughtful responses in the previous post. And the thoughtless response, "Red truck good war ice cream!"

* You know how some people begin talking about a complicated subject with, "I'm no expert or anything, but…"? Is it just me, or is this the linguistic equivalent of prefacing your sentence, "Now, I'm a dumb ass, but…"?

What responsibility comes with truth?

Let's say a friend is taking a herbal supplement for depression, like St. John's Wort. He tells you how much better he feels after taking it for a few weeks. Later, you read in the newspaper about a long-term, comprehensive study that says it proves that the herbal supplement has no medical affect. Do you tell your friend about the study?

And what conditions, if any, would make you change your answer?

In politics, the phrase "new low" is used so often in fits of hyperbole that it is almost a signal that the person using it is biased and exaggerating. So I hesitate about calling this a new low from the Bush campaign. But I can't think of a better candidate.

Several months ago, Moveon.org ran a contest where people could submit 30-second political commercials against President Bush. The best commercial would be aired a few times on national TV.

Over 1,500 ads were submitted and posted on the web site so people could vote for their favorites. One of these ads compared George Bush to Hitler. I'm not familiar with Moveon.org's screening process and whether anyone saw the ad before it was posted. Regardless, the ad shouldn't have been on the site because, in theory, it could have won. Also, it insulted a lot of fans of Hitler.

RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie and other conservative groups tried to equate the view in the ad with the views of Moveon.org and called on the nine Democratic presidential candidates at the time to denounce the ad, Moveon.org, and just for good measure, other evil groups like Planned Parenthood and Trader Joe's. Moveon.org pulled the ad, denounced the views expressed in it, and a few days later the RNC moved on to the next scandal: John Kerry's Botox injections.

That's the background for what may be the Bush campaign's new low, a new advertisement that tries to tie the aforementioned ad to John Kerry. The Bush campaign's ad is on the campaign site's front page, and contains many informative facts I did not know, like Al Gore compared President Bush to Hitler in a speech. How the hell did Gore keep that faux pas from every single major and minor media outlet? Maybe that was when he had a beard and no one was listening to him.

I should mention that, on a comedy note, the end is absolutely hilarious.

Things You Don't Want To Hear

…about your new haircut.
"Did you do that on purpose?"

…after telling someone that you walk dogs.
"Oh, Jason. Always with the jokes."

…from an audience member at an open mike after a particularly bad stuttering day.
"What's the deal with your stuttering? I mean, you don't really stutter that much, do you?"

Speaking of which, I'll be in Baltimore at the National Stuttering Association convention for the next few days. It started today; I got back a hour ago. I rented a SUV and I'm commuting from home (60 miles one way) in an attempt to simultaneously destroy the environment and save money. You know how some people in DC sell The Washington Post or bags of fruit while people are stopped at red lights? Today, I saw a man selling hair clippers.

(About the quotes: friends told me the first two, and I was instantly amused. The third happened almost a year ago, and while I think about the comment rarely, part of me hasn't yet released the Anger Bird so it can fly over the ocean and eventually drown in the Sea of Forgiveness due to starvation, the lack of food caused by overfishing of the Carp of Seething Resentment by the Wharfing Boats of Willy-Nilly. )

Pancake City Contest

During an interview with NPR today, Clinton was asked if he thought the U.S. intelligence bureaus should be restructured so they came under one, overarching department. Clinton gave a qualified yes. He said it would be a good idea on the condition that the restructuring did not create an atmosphere where homogeneous opinions would be encouraged and dissenting views suppressed.

Clinton's answer gave me an idea for another sporadic Pancake City contest. The contest: the first person to hear President Bush say a four syllable word gets a prize.

The rules:

1. The word must be four or more syllables.
2. Compound words and proper names are not valid (e.g. "evil-doers," "Condoleezza").
3. The word must have as many syllables as it is supposed to have.
4. Excluded words: all forms of terrorist and intelligence (e.g. "terrorisms," "intelligenced")

The first person to post the word, preferably with the context and time heard, wins a yet-to-be determined prize. Something small but personalized. The contest end date is whenever this post leaves the main page, approximately a week from now.

Good luck and happy hunting.

There's a giant company in my closet

Monster.com's current ad campaign features job hunters describing their skills and what they can offer to employers. The TV ads are a mix of folksiness and oatmeal container slogans. "Hi, I'm Bud. I have 23 years experience in systems engineering and analysis. If you want something done, I'll do it right. The way it should be done."

The tagline is, "There are thousands of candidates just like Bud on Monster.com," which is good, because this Bud doesn't come in a six-pack. But the message distracts from the real point. If your job web site has to resort to promoting unemployed people in a national television campaign to find them work, then either you need to expand the search engine categories from "easy work," "hard work," and "work it like a Polaroid", or the economy is doing much worse than any of us have thought.

The first time I saw this commercial, I expected it to end with "I'm John Kerry and I approved of this ad." A few tweaks and it becomes a diatribe against President Bush.

"Hi, I'm Bud. Thanks to George Bush, I have to appear in 1.2 million homes five times a week to even hope of tasting once again the sweet nectar of a full-time job. I can barely afford to feed my children. Bud Light is starving and last week, my daughter, Bud Dry, went to the hospital for dehydration. I can’t even afford the drugs she needs in America. If it weren't for our friends, the Molson's, we'd be on the street, lying in a gutter somewhere."

Daily Show

If you missed The Daily Show last night, go out of your way to catch the first 10 minutes of the repeat tonight at 7:00 (in the DC area). It encapsulates the best about The Daily Show and reminds one of the worst habits of major media outlets: avoiding or being timid about saying the truth in fear of seeming biased.

Random Thoughts

* I saw a video clip of Britney Spears after her knee injury. Britney Spears is the only person in the world who can wear a full-leg cast and still show some butt cheek.

* I stutter a lot on vowels. I'm the only American who wishes he was born in a better place: Kyrgyzstan. Maybe the two countries can set up an exchange program with me and a stutterer we know loves apple pie, aspires to assist others, and absolutely hates the KKK.

* In my sketch writing class yesterday, we each made a list of three emotions, three professions, and three physical deformities. We put each word on a separate slip of paper, organized them into three piles, and picked one from each pile to generate a character. My list is "confused, carpenter, no hair". At the end of the class, the instructor asked three of us to hold onto a pile for next week.

I got the physical deformity pile. When I woke up today for a walk, I found out that the slips of paper fell out of my notebook and were scattered on the ground. I wonder what people walking by thought of seeing a pile of paper with words on it like "deformed head," "No Leg (amputee)" and "dozens of ears."

The Zen of Nez

I believe there should be balance in life. That's why I drink expired Kaopectate.

WP Headlines

9/11 Plot Vetted by Bin Laden
See? Vetted. It's everywhere. It's the new "Kiss my grits."

O'Brien to Leave 'Access Hollywood'
Cites contractual dispute, co-hosts calling his reporting "O'crap."

Al Qaeda-Iraq Link Dismissed
Cheney acknowledges error, admits he should have stuck with original "Al Qaeda-Kevin Bacon-Iraq" link. Rues Cheney: "When you're making a Truth Sandwich, you can't leave out the Bacon."

Retired Diplomats Assail Bush Team
Retired diplomats join active diplomats, part-time diplomats, career diplomats, temporary diplomats, wipe you feet on the diplomat, the cast of Sesame Street, and other people who hate freedom.

Sketch Writing

The DC-based Theater Lab is offering a six-week sketch writing class. The class is $180 and starts this Sunday. I took it when it was last offered, a year and a half ago, and I'm taking it again. If you want more info about it, see the hyperlinked word "class" up above? Don't click on it. Click on this link instead.

The WWII Memorial

Sending Ripples Through The Pond

Even though Google's free email service, Gmail, is still in its beta stage and unavailable to the general public, it is already affecting its competitors. Yahoo! announced today that it is raising the storage limit on its free acconts from 5 mb to 100 mb and its attachment limit from 2 mb to 10 mb. Google offers 1 gig of storage.

While Yahoo! still offers an upgraded account with 2 gigs, they have acknowledged the obvious: no one is going to be making money from offering more email storage from now on. I'll be shocked if Hotmail doesn't follow Yahoo!'s lead in the next few weeks. It's inconvenience to switch email accounts, but 998 extra megabytes of storage and a spam-free account (at least for the first days) does a lot to quell inconvenience.

Word of the Year

vetted

I may say something more profound than this later, but suffice to say I strongly suspect that, besides the word's unfortunate lack of the letter 's', the word 'vetted' has been printed more times in the last year than the previously five combined.

Steven Wright

Steven Wright is performing at DC's Warner Theater on Friday June 18, 2004. Tickets are $30.50, not including Ticketmaster's well-deserved $7.20 convenience fee. I didn't know Steven Wright was still performing. The ticket price is on the edge of how much I'm willing to pay and I'm thinking of going. The only caveat is that I hear he turned into a prop comic.

The Road To Nowhere

Perhaps this isn't the best metaphor Bush wants for his campaign.

(P.S. Anyone want to get me an early birthday present?)

Today's Web Poll

Do you think Ronald Reagan should be on the $1, $5, $10 and $20 bills, or just the $1, $5 and $10?

This is an unscientific non-interactive poll.

Funny Personal Story

From crazy liberal Adam Felber.

I MUST KNOW WHO RANCE IS!!!!

Rance is a blogger who has become an Internet celebrity in the past few months. You see, Rance says he is a celebrity...but he won't tell us which one!

So, many of the fluff news sites (AOL, MSN, etc.) and a few of the non-fluff ones have written articles on this amazing mystery.

To me, the mystery is simple. One, it's not Ben Stiller. He's too busy appearing in 43% of the summer movies. And it's not anyone really famous because they have people to write their blogs for them. So who's a well-known actor that is only moderately popular and has the free time to tell people about his life?

I'll link to the answer so you can try to figure it out for yourself, but the clue is in his name, Rance. Or, if you add an F, France.

I hope Rance is just a regular guy playing a prank and posts a message like this one day:

"Hey all you fools who have been reading about what groceries I bought and how many times a week I do laundry. Well, guess what? I wasn't folding celebrity underwear. I was folding my own underwear. HA HA HA HA HA HA!"

Dream

I rarely remember my dreams unless I have them after I wake up and go back to sleep. Sometimes I wish I could remember more of them, and other times I'm glad I'm not because the parts I do remember are weird.

One fragment from today: I'm outside with some people I don't know in a grassy landscape with tress and hills around. Everything has a blue tint to it, some parts more than others. The tree leafs are a midnight blue and the trunk is cloaked in shadow. The grass is cyan, and it looks like it is night time with a strong moon out. I complain, "They got it wrong. There's too much blue in here." I was irritated because I felt someone didn't know what they were doing in Photoshop. Then the sun comes out, and the yellow light mixes with the blue to turn everything that should be green to green. I said something like, "Oh, now I get it. That's cool."

I read that men dream about strangers more often than women. It is at least true for me.

A Tribute

What I Learned Today

Occasionally I list interesting tidbits that I learned during the day. I do it mostly for myself because if I don't repeat what I learn either through telling it to someone or writing about it, I usually forget it. I suspect my friends wonder why I start random conversations about the Ugandan porn industry, but my friends are patient folk, so they deal with it.

What I Read Today
On the firing of George Tenet: "One George down, one to go."

Quote of the Day
Do your best not to say, "I told you so." Instead, say what you really think: "If I'd ran your life, we'd both be happy."

Company Names of the Day
(for a dog translator): Bowlingual
(yes, it's a real site) : Egay

What I Learned Today
Dolphins use whistles as names for each other. They get their whistle-name from their mothers when they are born. Males get whistles similar to their mothers; females get whistles different from their mothers. So some times, when a dolphin whistles. he is saying the equivalent of, "Hey Bob. Are you there?" And if Bob is nearby, he'll whistle Charlie's name. "Charlie, I'm caught in a tuna net. Help!" And Charlie will respond, "Hell no. They already named their mascot after me. I'm on Starkist's Ten Most Wanted list. When Starkist renames their "fish" Bob, give me a whistle." (book)

Theory of the Day
A few years ago, I had a powerful sense of déjà vu when I was talking to a clerk in a camping store. I had a gut feeling that I had met that person before but I didn't know where. In the car ride home, I realized that I had met someone the week before who looked very similar to him.

What made me think about déjà vu today I do not remember, but I have a theory about why it happens. Déjà vu occurs when someone is in a situation similar to one he has been in before but can not fully remember what the original situation is. As a corollary, people who can store a lot of information but are poor at recalling it experience déjà vu more often than people with better memories.

In other words, when one feels the sensation of déjà vu, there is a good reason for feeling it.

If Drugs Were Named After Video Games

"You wanna do some Super Mario? It'll get you real high."

Sometimes I think there is a heavenly battle for my soul. You see, the devil made my roommate buy an XBox. So God steps in and kills the heat sink in the Xbox so my roommate has to return it. So the devil retaliates by not only making my roommate exchange it, but by giving him a two-week project that sucks up all of his free time, and sending my other roommate on a trip for the weekend. God says, "Screw that. I'm going to scratch your "Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic" disk and I'll scratch the next one if you try to rent it from a different video store." Which I did.

That's where I stand today. To give you some background, and I say this without irony, I have a video game addiction. I have no problem using the word addiction because in the past, there have been moments where I have skipped meals so I wouldn't have to stop, lost interest in my normal activities (like writing for this blog), and thought about a game obsessively when I had to be away from it.

I've gotten much better at handling my bad habits with video and computer games. For the most part, I'm able to stay away from playing them (moderation isn't effective for me) and the few times recently I have caved in and went on a binge, it has been easier for me to stop when I needed to. But at the same time, I'm glad the game is too frustrating to play for long because it is scratched. It makes leaving the house much easier.

Thanks for the Hype, Disney

Fahrenheit 911 to come out June 25th.

"I am grateful to them now that everyone who wants to see it will now have the chance to do so," Moore said in a statement.

"On behalf of my stellar cast — GW, Dick, Rummy, Condi and Wolfie — we thank this incredible coalition of the willing for bringing 'Fahrenheit 9/11' to the people."