Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Obama's Slow Reveal

Though I fully intend to vote for Barrack Obama, I’m nothing at all like a True Believer.

For me, a vote for Barrack is a vote against John McCain and the Republican party. That is enough.

For some reason I don’t get a warm and tingly feeling in my tummy when I listen to Barrack speak. Never have. Even though so many of the people who I agree with and love and respect do get that feeling.

Truth be told, listening to him speak actually makes me like him less. He seems too good, too earnest, too squeaky-clean and upright and honorable to be true. I got a bit excited when I learned, early in the primary, that he smoked cigarettes. “Yes” I thought, “a flaw. Something dirty and stupid and self-destructive and weak. How he's more like me. Now I can relate.” Then he quit smoking.

Maybe I’m cynical, or simply too morally compromised myself to recognize a genuine idealist when I see one. But when I am listening to one of his speeches --- or attempting to read one of his books --- it just sounds too much like myself when I’m trying to impress an old lady.

And I think even the most fervent supporter should be able to admit --- even if only privately, in the secrecy of their own Prius with all the windows rolled up --- that if someone doesn’t get that tingle from Obama's words, then Obama doesn’t offer a whole lot else.

His resume, though impressive in its accomplishments, is thin. Let's just be honest and admit that.

If the Republicans have gotten traction out of any message, it is that we don’t know who this guy is. Because we don’t. He hasn’t been around for decades to become a known and familiar quality.

He spoke at the Democratic Convention in 2004, won the Senate Race in 2006 and didn't really get scrutinized until Spring of 2008.

What’s more, even as we have seen him, we still don’t know him. His policies are vague, amorphous promises to do everything good and nothing bad. His political philosophy is middle-of-the-road, let's-bridge-differences, can't-we-all-get-along blandness.

During his tightly-scripted campaign appearances, he hasn’t revealed much of psyche to us. Ever. Nothing seems to to jangle his nerves or dislodge that smile. Not once has emotion --- joy, frustration or anger --- get the better of his self-control in some sort of physical way. No tears. No pulsing veins in the temple. No spontaneous fist-pumps. Not when his old pastor stabbed him in the back. Not when he went to visit his “gravely ill” grandmother. Not when he accepted the freaking Democratic nomination for the President of the United States.

Compared to the incredible mass of tics and grimaces and eyerolls that McCain has become, this calm is reassuring. But still, Obama’s calm affability keeps his character hidden from us, as does his campaign's SuperGlue adherence the official campaign message.

That’s why, for me, the campaign is doubly important. Not only does it hopefully move a Democrat into the White House, but it gives us a real --- so far the only real --- insight into how Barrack Obama operates.

And I like what I see so far.

Like how he has tricked McCain and turned him into a whining crying little bitch-baby.

From Politico.com

Obama’s move to blanket multiple channels less than a week before the election was made possible by his decision to forgo participation in the public financing system for presidential campaigns.

The campaign spent between $4 million and $5 million to air the ad on NBC, CBS, Fox News and several other cable channels. 

McCain stayed within the public financing system, and has been limited to a budget of $85 million. In contrast, Obama raised $150 million in September alone.



Appearing Wednesday on CNN’s “Larry King Live,” McCain said the infomercial was “paid for with broken promises.” 

Obama “didn’t tell the American people the truth” when he claimed during the primary that he would negotiate in good faith on a course to public financing, he said.


I fucking love it. To somehow get the Republican party candidate to voluntarily give up the one advantage it perennially has --- the ability to raise lots of cash. That’s awesome.

And to see McCain reduced to whining about it to Larry King. Delicious. I thought Republicans were supposed to be the tough guys.

“Didn’t tell the American people the truth” McCain snivelled. Uh, John. He told us that he was going to do what he had to do to get elected. It’s possible that he didn’t tell you the truth about taking public financing. More fool you, sucker. So now you’re counting your pennies, while Obama is free to swamp your message. I love it.

It should be said that I don’t know for sure if Obama double-crossed McCain or not. And I don’t really care. Actually, I do care. I hope that he did double cross McCain. I hope he burned McCain like a match.

There’s a sports saying that goes “if you ain’t cheating, you ain’t trying.” After watching Gore and Kerry take the high road to electoral defeat, I’m glad we have another Democrat that is trying to win, and willing to do everything that means. Including cheat. Especially cheat. After the dirty tricks that Republicans pull every four years with voter registration lists and robo-calls and character assassinations, a little Democratic cheating only means we're playing the same game.

Also, I want to see some dirt inside Obama, just so I’ll know he’s for real. A genuine goody-two-shoes is beyond my capacity to comprehend. But a fake goody-two-shoes exterior that hides a shrewd, calculating, ruthless interior? That I understand. And approve. In fact, it's starting to give me a warm tingly feeling in my stomach.

More Bad Economic News

I just saw a white guy standing in front of Home Depot.

Friday, October 24, 2008

more standup from the fbomber

Joe the Plumber has become a conservative icon. Because, apparently, there are many Republicans out there who find Sarah Palin to be a little too intelligent and sophisticated to really get behind.

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Movie Review: Religulous

To my mind, Bill Maher is a national treasure. He’s one of the best comedians working today, and he is willing to use his considerable talents to fearlessly and loudly speak his mind. The fact that I agree with about 90% of his views --- he loses me at vegetarianism --- probably helps a lot. Not surprisingly, I loved Religulous.

For starters, the film is legitimately funny.

Maher starts at the physical site of Armeggedon and delves into organized religion’s heart of … well, not exactly darkness… more like silliness. A truck-stop church in a trailer. The Bible Land theme park. An anti-Zionist rabbi. A chubby Puerto Rican who claims to be Jesus Christ. An Israeli institute for creating Sabbath-law-circumventing gizmos. A fit, trim, very-well-groomed ex-gay. A creationism museum. An extraordinarily-full-of-shit Islamic rapper.

Though Maher goes into the project with a definite agenda, he is respectful enough to let the people he’s mocking do most of the work of making themselves look silly themselves. The resulting humor is more subtle than one might expect, mostly earned by the reactions and glances and tone of the interviews.

He also spends considerable time in thoughtful conversation with his family and others about the subject of faith, and belief. And whether people would or would not be better off without it.

It’s a lot of fun and definitely gives the viewer plenty to think about.

In the final two or three minutes, though, Mahar drops the levity. And the hammer.

The silly movie clips stop. The fun music ends. Shit gets serious. Maher matter-of-factly delivers the central message of the film in stark and electrifying terms. The three main monotheistic religions ---Christianity, Judaism, Islam --- all explicitly and rapturously predict and End of World cataclysm of destruction and death. For humanity to embrace these religions while simultaneously possessing the means to bring them about --- nukes and pollution --- endangers all our lives.

It’s a powerful ending to an entertaining and insightful… documentary? No. Comedy? Not really. Filmic essay? Yeah, that.

That said, I do have a problem with it. Two, actually.

First, I don’t think he goes far enough with his condemnation of organized religion. And, though I wouldn’t expect all religious foolishness to get equal time, the victims of his expose don’t get equal whacks from Maher’s mockery-stick. Second, I think Maher gives human nature too much credit, believing that chucking organized religion would fundamentally improve humanity’s chances of survival.

To make a gross and highly distorting generalization, Maher’s encounters and conversations with representatives of the three monotheistic religions can be summed up thusly.

1. Christianity has a Saying Stupid Shit problem.
2. Judaism has a Following Silly Rules problem.
3. Islam has a Killing People problem.

In reality, fundamentalist Christians and Jews do things much worse than spout off nonsense and create religious-law-loophole-defying devices. Though they don’t go for the kind of mass, frenzied blood-rallies that Muslims do over cartoons and books --- if you happen to cross them over something really important to them, they will gladly murder you for it in God’s loving name.

Just look at the abortion doctors gaffled in the U.S. or assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin for examples of the Christian and Jewish faith taken to the deadly extreme. Though I understand his desire to keep things light, I wish that he’d taken the gloves off a little bit more with these lunatics.

Secondly, Maher’s solution --- or rather plea --- is for humanity to simply get over religion. He implies that with that silly, superstitious, violence-encouraging deadweight off our collective neck, we could use our rationality and logic to create a better, more livable, more sustainable world.

I wish.

Personally, I happen to think that the problem isn’t religion. It’s people.

Again, specifically, the problem is the three-quarters of humanity occupying the less-than-prime territory on the fbomber’s Heart-Brain Quadrant.

The Smart & Mean quartile is always going to try to run things, the Dumb & Mean quartile is going to obey them, the Sweet & Dumb crowd will look confused and the Nice & Smart set will gnash their teeth while watching impotently.

For some time now, the Smart & Mean group has used religion as mind-control to ensure a docile and obedient population. But religion is by no means the only possible method. Other belief-systems have worked just as well.

The godless Communists of the Soviet Union and China each wasted a substantial of their own population without having to pray over it. The Nazis combined nationalism, a weird racial superstition and a dash of Darwin to justify treating millions of people like animals to slaughter. Pol Pot’s massacres were inspired in part by the Greek Philosopher Plato’s belief that anyone over ten years old was already too tainted to help build an ideal society. In the fbomber’s adopted home of Los Angeles people regularly get killed for going into the wrong neighborhood --- without religion’s help.

Which I think proves that it’s the mean people and stupid people who have to go, not their imaginary friend, God.

What’s my solution to that problem?

It’s radical, but simple. Make a single, strategic purchase at a hardware store. Then wait.

The most irretrievably Mean & Stupid people among us historically do a pretty good job of taking themselves out of the population without any help --- through wars, suicide bombings and driving Ford F-150s drunk on Wild Turkey.

Lately, however, they’ve greatly accelerated their removal process even more. Not through violence, though. Through architecture.

Above all other thing, Mean & Dumb people love to all get together in big groups to be stupid assholes in front of one another. And indulge in frenzied, showy rituals of empty self-congratulation.

Go to any backwards, unlivable shithole in the world --- right now, I am specifically thinking of Houston, Texas --- and the biggest, most impressive buildings in town aren’t going to be the hospitals, libraries, universities and City Halls. You know, those drab, neglected places where actual service to the community and improvement of the mind happen.

No, the shiniest, most capacious structures in town are going to be places for the Mean and Stupid to get together in mass numbers for high-volume, emotionally-charged, intellectually-vacant exercises in tribal reinforcement. In the Western world, that means churches, and their new incarnation, Mega-Churches --- or their secular equivalent, sports stadiums.

In the Muslim world, the biggest enclosed gathering places are mosques capable of holding thousands of kneeling, ass-raising worshippers at a time.

In Israel, the religious fanatics have taken a different path. Instead of individual buildings, they’ve built a single wall for themselves around the entire city of Jerusalem and much of their country so they can hide from the other religious fanatics.

The Mean & Stupid pack into these structures on a regular basis to hoot and holler and parade their unthinking loyalty to tribe. The Smart & Mean show up --- in a more comfortable and expensive section, naturally --- to exercise leadership and cement “regular guy” credentials. Lastly, the Sweet & Dumb crowd tags along too, just to see what all the excitement is about.

Historically, the Nice & Smart crowd has distrusted these large rally-type settings and stayed away. And for good reason. They know that if you get enough amped-up retards in one place, someone --- probably someone wearing glasses and carrying a book --- is going to wind up getting hurt badly. Consequently the Smart & Nice crowd has sniffed disdainfully, and tried to disparage this kind of indoor herd migration. Maher’s movie is an example of this disparagement.

But I think this is the wrong idea.

Instead of being discouraged, all the dummies and assholes of the world should be encouraged --- nay, exhorted --- to fill these churches, stadiums, mosques, synagogues and gymnasiums as often as possible. And in as large numbers as the buildings can physically hold. And to yell and stamp and chant moronic slogans as much as their ignorant, hateful hearts desire.

Because buildings have walls. And walls have doors.

And the Smart & Nice people --- if they have followed my advice and gone to the hardware store --- have padlocks to put on those doors.

From the outside.

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

More fbomber stand-up

The Republicans believed that the Presidential debates would be "game-changers."

They were right, but unfortunately for McCain-Palin, the game changed to Street Basketball.

fbomber standup

This Presidential election has taken an ugly racial turn lately. John McCain has changed his campaign slogan to "America: Do You Really Want to 'Never Go Back?'"

Friday, October 17, 2008

Plumber? More like Joe the Stupid Lying Law-Breaking Asshole



First off, I’ll confess that I did not watch or listen to the entire third Presidential debate. I tried, but was too saddened and put off by McCain’s feverish and pathetic aggressiveness to finish.

Jesus. I haven’t seen a white guy go after a black guy so hard since the Kimbo Slice fight.* From what I did see, McCain never managed to land a punch like that pink-haired MMA dude did, though. As mad as McCain was, Obama shrugged off the old man’s palsied jabs with the confidence of a fighter who knows that he’s so far ahead on points that he only needs to avoid getting knocked out to win the fight.

Still. The entire spectacle of McCain grimacing and clenching his increasingly deformed jaw while compressing his wattle-y old turkey-neck --- viewed in High Def --- was so stomach-turning that I watched some Tivo’d segments of “CSI: Miami” with a friend instead. Meaning --- astoundingly --- that compared to John McCain, David Caruso was the lesser douchebag of the night.

I should have kept watching the debate though. Because it looks I missed the emergence of the next shining political star for the Republicans. The clear favorite to be the bottom half of the Sarah Palin for President ticket in 2012.

Apparently, the final Presidential debate was really a debut party for the arrogant loser full-of-shit cocksucker called “Joe the Plumber.” For those who also missed the unveiling of America’s future VP --- one even more intellectually unqualified and personally repugnant than Governor Moose-fucker herself --- here’s the story.

While out on the hustings in Toledo, Obama happened upon this unmarried 34-year old toilet-unplugger, who was in his yard playing football with his 13-year-old son.

Joe took this chance to go up to the next President of the United States and pour some of the steaming pile of ca-ca in his bald head out through his mouth --- starting with this accusation, phrased as a question:
"I’m getting ready to buy a company that makes $250,000 to $280,000 a year. Your new tax plan is going to tax me more, isn’t it?"
The ever-gracious, ever-patient, almost painfully-earnest Obama proceeded to give Joe a very long, detailed, respectful answer to this question. An answer that visibly bounced off the dipshit Joe’s doughy, moronic, slit-eyed face as his weak brain grasped and fumbled for the next Fox-News-fed talking point he would poop out of his slack mouth-anus.

You could almost see him visibly relax when he finally got a firm mental hold of the next buzzword he was going to blindly excrete at the high-pressure jet of intelligence directed at him.

Twice that happened, with Joe’s contribution to the exchange being a look of stubborn, unsubdued, unashamed ignorance and the meager shit-pellets of a mumbled “American Dream” and “flat tax.” Shit-pellets that were so quickly swept away by the force of Obama’s considered, thoughtful, detailed hydrant-blast of information that they hardly left their stench of stupidity in the air.

Here, you can watch the hose-down for yourself:

Still, even those tiny, stinking little shit-pellets were enough to make Joe a hero to the Right. First over at Fox News, who raised this nobody to icon status as an entrepreneur emperiled by the socialistic schemes of Barack Obama. Then John McCain himself, who bandied Joe the Plumber’s name about in the debate, causing it to be mentioned two dozen times in total. Joe then went on some Fox News show himself. Katie Couric interviewed him. Fortune Magazine wrote an article entitled “McCain's best hope: Joe the plumber.”

The next logical step is for this guy to join the next Republican ticket. After all --- as a further investigation of Joe the Plumber proves --- he meets all the current requirements for a brilliant GOP career.

+++

1. He is a complete liar. For starters, his first name isn’t even Joe. It’s Sam. Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher. Wurzelbacher I can understand dropping. It’s a fucking bitch to pronounce. But Sam? What’s wrong with Sam? Why is this guy so determined to go by an alias? Clearly, he loves to lie so much, that he can't even say his OWN NAME with any honesty.

2. He is delusional. According to his boss, who Joe/Sam was supposedly going to buy this business from, the only time they discussed this potential transaction --- the one that Joe/Sam thought important enough to personally critique a United States Senator’s proposed tax plan over --- was SIX FUCKING YEARS AGO. DURING THEIR INITIAL JOB INTERVIEW. Since then, there have been no negotiations, no assessments, no discussion of transfer terms. In other word, when Joe/Sam said that he was “getting ready to buy” a business what he meant was that he was thinking about it. To himself.

Well, fuck-a-duck, Sammy. I’m thinking about importing a freight-container full of 18-year-old sex-slaves from Eastern Europe. Sometimes I think about it half a Kleenex box worth a day. That doesn’t mean that the next time Obama comes canvassing my block I’m going to harangue him to legalize prostitution and human trafficking statutes to better suit my fantasies.

3. He can’t fucking add up numbers. The business Sammy was thinking about buying --- a two-person outfit named Newell Plumbing and Heating Co. of Toledo --- only makes a net profit of somewhere between $100 - $200k per year.

Given what we’ve seen of Sam/Joe so far, even if he ever does buy the business --- a gargantuan “if” --- I think it’s safe to say that he’s not the kind of businessman who’s going to raise their revenue by 25-150% anytime soon. So the whole higher-taxes-over-$250k wouldn’t even apply to him.

4. He thinks that he does not need to abide by the law. Even though the county where he lives requires plumbers to be licensed, neither he or his employer possess this needed credential. The local plumbers union says that he applied for an apprenticeship in 2003, but “never completed the work.” So, apparently, Joe/Sam thinks that it is okay to flaunt local professional requirements, and to perform plumbing work that may or may not abide by the relevant building codes… because, well, he’s Joe/Sam, that’s why.

What’s more, he doesn’t seem to want to pay his hospital bills or tax bills. He’s had two liens taken out against him for $1100 apiece for nonpayment of those pesky little expenses he incurred and subsequently ignored.

5. He is --- let’s just say --- a bit insensitive to some obvious racial issues. Obama, instead of ignoring Joe/Sam like the ignorant little shit-stirrer that he is, paid him the respect of addressing his truculently phrased question as if it were an honest request for information. A request that he fulfilled with a deluge of facts, figures and philosophical justifications regarding his proposed tax plan.

Joe/Sam not only visibly hardened himself against hearing --- much less understanding and processing that answer --- but later characterized it as “a tap dance.” One that, he said, was “almost as good as Sammy Davis Jr.”

Sammy Davis Jr.? Tap dancing? Um, Sam/Joe, you do realize that you are talking about a black man here? Sammy Davis Jr. and tap dancing might not be the appropriate metaphor to use. Tap dancing in particular carries some subtle and historical negative racial connotations of minstrel and blackface shows.

Why not just go straight for a set of breakdance, rap and fried chicken references and be done with it, Joe/Sam? With a watermelon and malt liquor chaser while you're at it? Why hold back?

+++

So there we have it. Mean. Stupid. Dishonest. Criminal. Living in an ideologically-pure fantasy world. And despite all these shortcomings, breath-takingly arrogant. Even in the face of all his intellectual, legal and social deficits, this colossal jackass has the clanking, swinging balls to believe that he can legitimately engage in intellectual debate with someone who is so obviously and publicly his superior in every possible way.

Sound like anyone we know? Actually that’s a trick question. It sounds like every successful Republican Presidential candidate ever. Fuck VP. Fuck waiting until 2012. I'm shocked that the Republicans don’t ditch McCain and run Joe on the top slot right now.

----

* The fbomber hates to bandy ethnic generalizations around, but has to point out that this Presidential race has turned traditional racial stereotypes on their head.

In his quest to be President, Obama has conducted himself with stereotypical characteristics of older white males: He has been methodical, rational, organized and disciplined nearly to the point of dullness.

By contrast, John McCain has shown the characteristics that racists commonly apply to younger black men: Untrustworthiness. Poor impulse control. Aggressiveness. And a lifelong obsession with fucking blond women.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

W the Movie

Here’s a link to the trailer of the new Oliver Stone joint, “W.” which apparently gives George W. Bush the biopic treatment he deserves --- contemptuous and mocking.

www.wthefilm.com

I heard Oliver Stone talking on Bill Maher's show about this movie. Crazed, loony liberal that he is, Stone said that he did not make shit up for this movie. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to, but that he didn't need to. The information and quotes on the public record about Bush were more dramatic and theatrical than he could have fabricated himself.

I believe that.

Stone also alluded to the fact that GWB is a mystery. I really believe that, too. Here we are, 8 years later and as much as we --- or at least, I --- like to belittle the man, I don't know anyone who has a real sense of what he's made out of or what makes him tick. I certainly don't.

It's easy to dismiss him with pejoratives that capture an element of his persona --- chimp, frat-boy, asshole, bully, etc... --- but he's more than just that one (or even all) of those things.

I just can't figure the guy out at all.

For instance... I don't even know if he's smart or dumb. Honestly.

I know it's easy to call him a moron for all the obvious, visible reasons he gives us. But, hold on, this is a guy who got to do pretty much every thing he ever wanted to do in his life by his 60th birthday. Without even starting to try until after he was 40. And who has manipulated supposedly brilliant guys like Tony Blair and Colin Powell and then flushed them away like used toilet paper afterwards. There's something sharp and pointed in there someplace, but I don't know what it is exactly.

In a similar manner, I can't really fathom what pleasure he has gotten out of the Presidency. Clinton clearly reveled in the pomp and attention and chance to be the biggest mover in the world's most powerful country. I don't sense that in W, though. It's like he's kind of going through the motions so much of the time... cramped and sulky and reluctant. And other times --- usually inappropriate --- he's loosey-goosey and near manic with high-spirited nicknames and jigs and personal teasing pokes at reporters and foreign dignitaries.

Also, is he a dickhead or not? Yeah, he mocked a woman about to get lethally injected. But he seems to be a genuinely loving and decent dad to his daughters.

Some other things I don't know for certain:

Is he really all that religious? Is he really not drinking? What happened with that “pretzel” passing out incident? Is he really so intellectually incurious as he appears? Does he really not follow events at all? What really motivated him to shoot for the highest office in the land? Of all the things he did the last 8 years, which did he really want and which were thrust on us by the scum-circle around him?

In short, just who is this guy that's been running the show since January of 2000?

I've read the books, I've watched the news, I've combed the blogs. And he's still a mystery to me even, as he's getting ready to pack his bags.

I think that's bizarre. This last eight years has been tumultuous and wrenching and exhilarating beyond any eight years I've ever lived through in my life. 9/11, Afghanistan, Iraq, Katrina, the Bush Boom, the Financial Meltdown. The Bailout.

In other words, W and I have been been through some shit together.

Whether I agree or disagree with the decisions he's made. I should have a sense of some kind of understanding --- at least knowing at an emotional level --- why he's made the decisions he's made. Like some die-hard 1930's Republican might hate the New Deal, but at least understand why FDR was pushing it out there.

Or --- here’s a better analogy --- how some hippy might not like Nixon, but at least understand why a paranoid, fascist, rotten-hearted creep like him would do the things he did.

I honestly don’t have that with Bush.

Bush's intellectual and emotional core has been hidden behind multiple, light-proof, airtight seals and chambers --- the Republican Party aristocracy, the emotionally deformed Bush Family, the ultra-secretive White House lockdown, and his own impermeable smirking facade --- for so long, I've given up on ever glimpsing his psyche. What's more, I haven't read any credible accounts from people who have. For all his folksy informality, he's one of those sphinxes --- like the iconic Reagan --- who leave even their closest associates (never friends, these people never have real friends) scratching their heads about what's really behind the affable shell.

Maybe this film will help illuminate this psyche.

I kind of doubt it. This biographical information has been out there long enough and hasn't really shed any usable light yet. For whatever mysterious reasons, George W. Bush has been a complete, unalloyed, toxic, flaming, radioactive, crashing disaster of a Chief Executive. He's combined awful ideas with even worse executions. He's weakened or destroyed everyone who supported him and strengthened everyone who opposed him. Everything that he has touched has turned into liquid, poisonous shit. Everything that he has ignored has festered into oozing, gangrenous sores.

Clearly, as a President, he is the Very Worst Ever.

Frankly --- at this point --- I've kind of lost interest in finding out exactly why.

I guess there is a sort of taxonomic value to understanding the nature of the GWB beast. If we can identify what kind of creature it is, then we can better build defenses against future incarnations of it. Or better yet, learn to crush potential Georgies in their immature stage --- while they are running redneck states, crappy baseball teams and failing companies.

Other than that, what's the use of putting that proven loser under a microscope?

Focusing on his personal failings is beside the point.

As tempting as it is to pin everything that happens on his incompetent and deserving back, we are all to blame really.

George W Bush was a mistake that all of America made.

Some of us made it bigger and more passionately than others, but we all made it.

We all thought that America was inherently awesome enough that we could put someone who was clearly substandard in charge of it --- and then let him freely and obviously fuck things up --- without any serious consequences. That nation-wide mistake is the only explanation for why Bush didn't receive the kind of real resistance that would have made it impossible to continue doing his visible and blatant fucking up of this country, without pause or slowdown, to this very day.

I'm not just talking to the dumbasses who have ever applied a "W" bumper sticker to the back of their bloated and shoddily-constructed SUV. Though those people make a satisfying herd of scapegoats, they are so emotionally and mentally subnormal that we really couldn't expect anything more than jingoistic, moronic hate-echoes from them anyway.

I'm talking to the rest of us. “Oh well,” we shrugged, watching an election stolen, a stupid war started, the budget balanced wrecked, a city drowned, the Constitution shredded, and the economy metastasize into a giant Ponzi scheme ready to collape, “there’s always 2004-slash-2008.”

With that kind of stupidity, apathy, arrogance, entitlement and laziness so ingrained and widespread through this nation --- and yes, this writer --- clearly we were headed for some sort of disaster no matter who had been in charge all this time.

Bush just sped it up and made it more painful than it otherwise would have been. So while this movie all-so-deservedly kicks Bush while he is down, I hope it has the honesty to aim a few boots at the rest of us as well.

We've earned them.

Saturday, October 04, 2008

Lazy, Half-Assed Blog Posting

I received an email from a Republican friend (yes, I have some) who said, in essence:

1. He thought McCain won the first Presidential Debate.
2. Sarah Palin is a joke.
3. Obama, who he respects as a person, reminds him of Carter, who he also respects as a person. But that Carter was crushed by world events, and he fears Obama would be too.
4. McCain reminds him of Reagan, and we need a Reagan more than a Carter in this dangerous world.
5. The fbomber is hilarious, and bound for great success as a standup comedian.

My response:

I thought McCain came out on top of the debate with Obama as well. He didn't look obviously overmatched by Obama's famed rhetorical brilliance.% McCain kept it simple, he hit the same emotional buttons over and over, he was aggressive and gave the impression of victory. Since I don't know the rules of debate, and these things are purely theater anyway, that seemed like enough to make up a victory for McCain. I was actually quite discouraged by the debate.

Later, though, analysis seemed to point out that the debates helped Obama in the places he needed it... independents and undecideds. Turns out, his campaign brains didn't want the debate to make raving Dems like me feel good at watching McCain's nose rubbed in shit. They wanted the fence-sitters to see that Obama could appear Presidential. Mission accomplished there.*

This made me realize that Obama and his strategists are really two or three steps ahead of me on this thing, effectively planning and cleanly executing the very delicate and complicated set of dance steps they've determined can win this election for him. That, more than anything else, has turned me slowly from a Obama tolerator to a reluctant yet ever-warming Obama supporter. If^ he could bring the same level of analysis, intelligence, preparation and execution into the office as he brought into the campaign, I would be happy with how he handled the job.

That's the place I'm at now. Intelligence, competence and seriousness are enough for me.+

By contrast, John McCain's behavior and decisions of this campaign radiate the qualities diametrically opposed to intelligence, competence and seriousness. He's not stupid, but clearly he doesn't put a lot of weight on analysis and investigation before he makes a decision. He certainly doesn't seem to have a solid, workable campaign plan that he's determined to follow. And his surprise pick of a controversial, unqualified nobody like Sarah Palin as a running mate shows that he doesn't really respect the consequences of this race beyond getting into the office.

So you think McCain is another "go with the gut" guy, like Bush II and your icon Reagan.** And Obama is another "in his head" guy like Carter, Bush I, Woodrow Wilson, et al.

Even if you are mistaken, and Obama turns out to be a combo head and gut guy --- like JFK and my icon, Clinton## --- I'm okay with a head guy.

I think that smart, principled, strategic thinking what we need right now --- even more than the ability to make great snap decisions.

We can't predict or prepare for theoretical, unforeseen events that might need an instantaneous response.

But we can analyze our present, real and pressing crisis. And choose someone with the skills and temperament to address it.

Our biggest current problem is that we are buried in a concentric circle of ruins --- economic, military, diplomatic ---- and first need to dig ourselves out.

Then we need to intelligently, strategically and competently reorder our house so that it doesn't collapse so completely again. In this scenario, I want to be headed up by someone who likes to take measurements and draw up blueprints, as opposed to someone who eyeballs where to throw up some walls. Or, worse yet, is determined to continue the same demolition activities that collapsed our home in the first place.

Thing is, whatever events transpire, whoever gets elected next is going to have to focus most of his attention on rebuilding anyway.

After all, being able to effectively respond to the kind of world events that get thrown our way depends on getting our ruins cleared away as cleanly and quickly as possible.

So even if one accepts your premise that President McCain would react more coolly and decisively (Reaganesquely?) in a crisis that occurs after January 20th^^ his reaction would be constrained by the economic, military and diplomatic wreckage George W. Bush created --- i.e. we're broke, our military is overstretched, everyone hates us.

Since McCain doesn't even pretend to have a plan to clear that rubble, that's where we would stay, no matter how putatively brilliant his response from the gut.

That's not acceptable to me.

---

% Funny how everyone, from pundits to the public, grades Republicans on the curve in debates. Like we automatically assume the Democrat is smarter and better at having, expressing and defending his or her ideas. All the Republican has to do is not be humiliated to be able to claim a victory.

It’s like Democrats are competing to beat real Olympics times, but Republicans only have to beat Special Olympics standards to get the medal. Which should effectively topple the fantasy that Republicans are the party that believes in rewarding individual merit and achievement. They have no problem with affirmative action, or the soft bigotry of low expectations --- as long as they give stupider, whiter, richer, more religiously fanatic people a leg up.

*Obama's measured, respectful, friendly performance was also smart for other, uglier reasons. As much as I would have loved to see a Democrat forcefully inflicting grievous injuries on a Republican, there is an optics issue to consider. I suspect that for many people in this nation, the sight of a younger, blacker man exhibiting anger towards an older, whiter man would create a sense of discomfort.

^ This is an enormous “if.” But since this Obama has succeeded at every other thing he’s had to do so far, it's no stretch to believe that he can pull this off, too. Obama seems to be the luckiest guy I’ve ever seen in my life. So lucky that it can’t be just luck. Nobody can be this lucky. He’s got to be good, too.

+The evil variety, as exemplified by Dick Cheney, does not count.

** The love for Reagan is one of those blind spots I have in relation to other guys my age, kind of like Fantasy Football, which I think is just taking watching sports and giving yourself homework.

I just don't fucking get what was so great about that guy. To me, everything he said sounded great. But he wore black shoe polish in his hair and more rouge than my Aunt Ezma. And everything he did was either stupid (Star Wars defense system) or destructive (cut taxes + raise spending) or mean (firing Air Traffic Controllers) or uselessly theatrical (invade Grenada) or some combination of those things.

Is simply saying the right things good enough to achieve Legend status? I guess so. He is known as "The Great Communicator" not "The Great Chief Executive." So also falls the fiction of Republicans being about substance rather than appearance.

As for his goading of the Soviet Union through insulting rhetoric and deficit spending to fatally blow their budget on weapons slightly before we blew ours... I will concede that the stupid, inflexible, vain, incurious, simple-minded, lazy, callous, naive, remote, self-absorbed Ronald Reagan was a broken clock that turned out to be right exactly one time. But that is as far as I will go.

## Peace. Prosperity. Sloppy, fat-girl blowjobs. Really, what's not to like?

^^ A supposition not borne out by his campaign behavior, by the way. Campaign off. Campaign on. Debate off. Debate on. Fly into DC. Fly out of DC. All over a fucking bill in Congress he didn't even contribute to. How many more pallets of Depends would he have gone through over something that actually needed his input?