The Biggest (A)-Hole In Our Constitution

I have heard Antonin Scalia talk about his judicial philosophy many times, most recently on a 60 Minutes segment.

He is a slippery and charming bastard who often refers to himself as an "Originalist" who is an opponent of the idea of a "living constitution."

Which makes me wonder if the Constitution is in his mind dead.

It also makes me wonder if this "Originalist" has ever read about the origins of the Bill of Rights.

It is a fact lost to most Americans today but the Constitution was originally ratified without those famous first ten Amendments.

This was because many Founders (especially the Federalists like Hamilton) were concerned that the act of enumerating certain rights in the Constitution could later be misconstrued as implying that whatever rights they had not specified, singled out or mentioned did not exist.  In other words - if a certain right isn't specifically defined in the document then you don't have it.  

Like the right to breathe.  Or the right to take a walk on a sunny day.  Or the right to annoyingly baby talk to your cat.

They preferred the English Common Law system which doesn't define or quantify certain rights but rather accepts them as rational, commonsense and tacitly understood.

 

(Side Note - you'd have to go back to Henry II to understand the English system's evolution and how it works but to give you an idea in England even the killing of someone in cold blood isn't defined specifically as a crime.  This either shows us how effective common law is or how polite the English are that they don't need a law to say murder is wrong.  It's just understood to be rude and not terribly helpful.)

Now you'd have to be a real A-hole to interpret the Constitution in such a narrow minded, limited and nitpicky capacity, to actually argue that any right not spelled out does not exist.

I mean really, it would take an A-hole of almost gravity-defying proportion to think along these lines. You'd almost have to be an A-hole so big and so dense you were in danger of collapsing in on yourself like a dying star.

But the Founders were very shrewd and they knew that while history has shown us from time to time we may have droughts, famine or even a dearth of brave and ingenious men, there is never, ever a shortage of assholes.

So because of these fears the Bill of Rights wasn't actually passed until 1791, the third year of Washington's first term.

It was the fulfillment of a promise the founders had to make to the states to get them to ratify the Constitution and centralize authority to the degree that the Federalists were proposing.

Because in order to accept such a radical rethinking (actually a complete overhaul) of the Articles of Confederation the states had exacted promises that a Bill of Rights must be added and added in short order.  

In fact Thomas Jefferson wrote a scathing letter to his protege James Madison (who is considered by many to be the father of the Constitution) about the lack of inclusion of a Bill of Rights.

Eventually it became clear to everyone it was either add a Bill of Rights or no dice on the Constitution making it in the long haul.

So Madison, working as a member of the House of Representatives from Virginia pushed through what eventually became our first 10 Amendments - freedom of speech, freedom of the press, separation of Church and State, the right to bear arms and so on.

Therfore from its very inception the Constitution was already a living document.

This still left the aforementioned problem.  The idea that any right not spelled out did not exist.  

This was solved rather easily by the clever Ninth Amendment which reads, "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

So case closed, right?

Wrong.  Enter Antonin Scalia.

His "Originalist" philosophy is exactly what the founding fathers were afraid of.

Contrary to everything history has taught us about the constitution being a living document he sees it as a deceased one, incapable of change no matter what technological, generational or moral evolutions occur in this country.  

According to him we must abide by exactly what was laid down by the Founders in the summer of 1887.

Case closed.

This is so contrary to what the Founders intended it should be laughable.

Obviously the Constitution is a living, vibrant document that must, has to change with society.

About this idea Jefferson once said, "... as we grow older, as a republic you cannot expect a man to wear a boy's jacket."

What a wonderfully succinct way to put it.  Expecting today's society to be ruled by something 18th century men thought up is obviously (excuse the continuation of the metaphor) a poor fit.

In fact, the meager 27 amendments we have added in 200 plus years would probably be rather horrifying to Jefferson.  He would most likely have expected hundreds by now.

He was actually for holding a new Constitutional Convention every 30 years because to paraphrase him - the earth belongs to the living.

In my mind there is no greater argument for a living constitution than what I have just laid out.

However Scalia refuses to see it as thus and governs as if he were a Justice in 1808 instead of 2008.

This brings me to my final point and what I feel should be the 28th Amendment to the Constitution.

Supreme court appointments should no longer be lifetime.  People live too long for this to make sense anymore.

We must accept that when the Constitution was written a man was exceedingly lucky to live to 40.  Now we are faced with a Chief Justice and other Justices who will be on the court until they die in their 70's or 80's, long after their mental capacity has diminished and long after they have the right to rule for a much younger populace.

We should shorten their term to 15-20 years.  This would rid us of the burden of 80 year-olds making decisions that affect all of us long after they are dead.

This would also hopefully ensure a modern understanding of today's society is and would always be reflected by the court.

As a bonus it would also mean it's time for Scalia to retire (and Clarence Thomas).

In my mind that makes the argument - you guessed it - case closed.

A Promise Fulfilled

Thomas Jefferson, a slave owner, wrote this in a hot Philadelphia boarding room 232 years ago.

 

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal..."

You know the rest.  Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness - a greatest hits of enlightenment principles cribbed brilliantly from John Locke and others.

We call it the "Declaration of Independence".

But in point of fact it was more than just a simple declaration.  

It was a challenge.

It was a challenge from the New World to the Old which said loudly and clearly that the class system, the entrenched aristocratic order, the lack of opportunity for the ordinary man which had persisted for centuries in Europe would not cross the Atlantic with the colonists. 

That challenge was the beginning of America.

However this beautiful, lyrical assertion of equality was to be followed by over 100 years of slavery, segregation, lynchings, voter suppression, discrimination and other wrongs that continued well into my lifetime.

It was to say the least, a good idea delayed.

 

But last Tuesday something happened.   

Last Tuesday that aged, (some would say withering) 200 years long promise of equality was finally, resoundingly kept.  

I will never, ever forget where I was nor the size of the lump in my throat when I heard the announcer say, "This just in, Barack Obama is now the next President of the United States."

Barack Obama is of course an African-American man.  

I did not vote for him because he was such nor do I think did most people (which may say more about how far we've come than anything). 

No I voted for him for a myriad of reasons - because I got the sense he understands profoundly the deep problems this country is facing, because he seems to be a man of action and yet also quiet thoughtfulness and unhurried deliberation.  Because he appears to be possessed of both the political genius to win a campaign and more importantly the unwavering determination to bring people together once the campaign is over.

I voted for him most of all because I believe I glimpsed in him that rare, Lincoln-esque combination of characteristics so often diametrically opposed to each other - great confidence mixed with even greater humility.

But I cannot deny that in the aftermath of November 4th the fact that he we have finally elected an African-American as President has magnified my esteem and pride for this country tenfold.

Because now and for all time we have shown the World that indeed we meant and still mean what was written in that hopeful declaration those many years ago.

Thomas Jefferson is perhaps still most famous for his authorship of that document.  Yet when he lived he was known for many things.  

For being an incredible writer, a tremendous thinker and most of all an inveterate, incurable optimist.

He was known for his unceasing belief that man is good, that given the right set of circumstances and opportunities a utopian, truly egalitarian society could emerge from the wilderness that was America in 1776.

He was called naive and a dreamer in his day because he dared posit that we could someday establish a more perfect union where no matter how high or low-born one might be they would still have the chance to be something, to be someone, to make a difference, to reach their highest potential for mankind.

I see Obama as proof that Jefferson was right.

It's Here!

Election day is here.  As I write this I'm at the Minneapolis airport in transit between NYC and Seattle.

We will hopefully know where this thing is headed by 4:30 Pacific time.

Right now I'm alternating back in forth between feeling confident that my guy (Obama) will win and being riddled with unbearable anxiety.

I even tried to go over to the Larry Craig bathroom and get a blow job to release some pent up angst but I couldn't find the stupid terminal.

Why am I so nervous?

Because I truly believe a McCain victory would be the death knell for the American middle class.

Also I'm scared his Supreme Court Justice appointments would tilt this country so far to the right I wouldn't be able to recognize it again in my lifetime.

Elections are odd things.

I never feel so powerful and yet so powerless as I do on this day.

Last time I was ebullient early, then filled with disbelief and finally resignation as the night wore on.

This time I hope to be exceedingly, obnoxiously gleeful both early, often and late.

We shall see.

At any rate, the momentary thrill I get casting my ballot makes it all worth it.

I am always filled with pride and thankfulness that I'm a citizen of this country every single time I do it.

We were the first nation, the first people to posit the theory that man was capable of rational self-government.

That Democracy did not necessarily lead to devolution into mob rule.

Europe laughed at us when we began this experiment all those years ago.

But we believed that man was not born beastly in his nature, but is kind, thoughtful and capable of perfection.

Let's hope we prove ourselves right.

ATTENTION WHITE PEOPLE

Barack Obama's First Five Initiatives

(According to an email I just got from the GOP)

1. ATTENTION WHITE PEOPLE  

You have 24 hours to turn over your property to the government.  

This includes any and all jewelry, electronics and personal items worth over 2 dollars American.

You are allowed to keep one toothbrush per family.

2. ATTENTION WHITE PEOPLE  

Square Dancing is now a crime and will result in a $500 fine per do-si-do.  

The Charleston, the Cha-Cha and the Quick Step have also been suspended pending further review.  

3. ATTENTION WHITE PEOPLE  

In order to make-up for slavery you are now required to do one chore per week for a black person.  

Your black chore-master will be assigned on a random basis via lottery on January 21, 2009.  

Chores will begin Wednesday of the following week. 

4. ATTENTION WHITE PEOPLE  

Unless you can backwards tomahawk dunk, playing Basketball is now a Class A Misdemeanor.

This means you, Steve Nash.

 

5. ATTENTION WHITE PEOPLE  

You no longer have a “black friend.”

So stop calling and inviting him to play Squash, watch Jude Law movies and other lame white people shit.

He will contact you when the need arises as you are now his "white friend."

Prayer for the Innocent Dead

Here's a few lines from Dylan Thomas' poem "Ceremony After a Fire Raid".

I saw them on the wall at the British Imperial War Museum.

Myselves
The grievers
Grieve
Among the street burned to tireless death
A child of a few hours
With its kneading mouth
Charred on the black breast of the grave
The mother dug, and its arms full of fires.

This was written in the wake of the German bombings during the Battle of Britain.

It gave me the strongest sense of what an average English citizen must have felt in those bleakest of days.

I suppose (and I can only guess) it must have seemed as though hell was not below them but somehow above, pouring hatred and loss upon all those who were innocent and familiar.

What feeling of powerlessness, what sense of weakness, what unending fear must it have extracted from their souls?

Then when all was said and done, when the sky was quiet and the earth still, what final numbness must it have left them with?

The senselessness of it all, the pulverizing effect on the psyche must have been the worst. 

Again I'm only guessing but that's what I get from the poem.  

Because it reads to me like a man unable to mourn or wail yet again, so as a writer he can only describe what he sees.  

Unemotional but evocative.

His description of death as tireless is the most striking and telling part of the stanza.

It paints a picture of annihilation as a daily visitor, a commonplace thing.  

Mundane like the garbageman or letter-carrier yet also powerful as a God, unstoppable, superhuman and most of all unceasing. 

I sense he is describing something that was beyond their ability to withstand anymore.

It reminded me of 9-11 and the horror of that morning.

Then because I am human first and American second, it made me think of what our (accidental?) bombing of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan has wrought on the ordinary people of those countries.

I can imagine a beautiful poem about it will be written in their language someday.

I look forward to reading it then.

But for now I look forward to the end of bombing.

Everywhere.

Congrats! I'm Expecting!!!

Yeah, we all are.

All of us who have waited for our beloved country to lurch back towards the left.

Or towards what would ostensibly, realistically and fairly be called the new center.  

Because let's be honest.  It ain't like we're gonna be moving FAR SOVIET UNION LEFT into some kind of totalitarian nightmare where we're on camera all the time, wearing drab uniforms, walking around like the living dead and subsisting on a diet of gruel.

That's for Wal-Mart employees.

But we're expecting that things will change.  That much is certain.  The question is...

How fast?

Are my expectations for immediate universal health care, a non-imperialist foreign policy, serious alternative energy initiatives and the dismantling of the military industrial complex too much to hope for? 

Probably.

A more apt question might be does this moment, this death knell for Reaganomics precipitate disaster (as my conservative friends would have me believe) or does it precipitate a new era of peace and prosperity for the middle class?

Will it be kinda like the 50's only without the the ass-backwards social mores?

I hope it will.  I think we all do.  Even Joe the Plumber.

But I do also believe that I and my left of center friends are in for some frustrating times.

Because we're not gonna get all we want when we want it.  It doesn't work like that.

The ship of state turns around like a giant cruise-liner.  You can't feel it, you have to look at the horizon to even know you're turning.

Because (other than the Civil War and the American Revolution) change is always incremental.

So I urge patience.  Patience to all.

As the Reverend King said, "... the moral arc of the universe is long but it bends towards justice."

Look where we were at the beginning of the 20th century in regards to segregation, worker's rights, women's rights (they couldn't even vote), child labor laws, etc. and so on in a never ending list of things that would seem repulsive and obviously wrong to us today.

We have indeed made great strides, both moral, technological and financial in the last 108 years.

Yet...

We live at a time of great peril.  Peril of our own making.  We use too much of the World's natural resources.  We have embraced corporate fascism and all the low-low price bargains it can bring.  We have outsourced our entire manufacturing sector and are enjoying the fruits of de facto off-shore slavery.

We make nothing.  We consume everything.

Yet if we are willing to embrace a few changes we can save this Nation from self-immolation. We need humility.  We need compassion for our fellow countrymen.  We need to pour every resource and tool we have into educating the next generation of Americans.  We need our corporations to be patriotic in their decision making, whether it be the decision to keep jobs here, or the decision to treat employees fairly and reward the dignity of work with a living wage.

Most of all we need to become a self-sufficient republic, not the imperialist, expansionist world police force we believe ourselves to be.

That last sentence is especially important.  Because if we want to heal the World we could not do much better than to follow the advice of Jesus who said quite succinctly, "Physician heal thyself."

I hope we do heal. 

But I know that it takes time.  I know some of you will give up.

I won't.  I'm in this for the long haul, watching the horizon slowly drift past.  

Join me on the deck, won't you?

Crises, Economic and Personal

So Obama may win.  Good.  

I said he "may" win because 13 years in show business has taught me nothing is final until the contract is signed and your lawyer is paid.

I just want it to be over.  I can't stand the coarse nature of the political discourse in this country anymore.  Plus stress-wise this has been like game 7 of the NBA Finals for like 2 years.

Nationally everything sucks right now.  Clubs going out of business right and left, no one with money to spend on entertainment... and trust me folks, we have not even begun to make out the beginning of the murky depths of the bottom of this crisis.

Things will be bad for a long time before they are finally mediocre and then someday, hopefully tolerable.

I'm flying across the country to be with my girlfriend on election day.  That's how much this whole shebang means to me.  I want to be with someone I dearly love when the elephant hits the mat, when Reaganomics finally implodes upon itself in a shitstorm of plummeting home values and socialization of banks.

I only wish Milton Friedman and Ronnie himself were alive to see what the free market hath wrought.

I thought it was telling when Alan Greenspan said the other day that he thought the banks would "police themselves."

This proves beyond a shadow of a doubt ol' Alan is an ivory tower math nerd with no understanding of human behavior.  

Let me ask you this, Alan - are societys capable of policing themselves or do they, not to be redundant, need a "police" force to keep the peace and make sure everyone stays in some semblance of order?

Why should a financial institution, an organism made up of humans, be any different than regular humans?

People require regulation, laws and enforceable agreed upon rules to live by.

I believe, like Jefferson, in the perfectibility of man.  Unfortunately we live in a Hamiltonian world of cut-throat capitalism.

Therefore and forever we require laws.  No one, no individual, no institution, no political body, no politburo, no stock exchange, no police force even, is capable of self-regulation.

On a personal note I'm really, really fucking tired of doing stand-up.

I don't do drugs (save the occasional Xanax), I don't drink and I don't try to fuck young, middle aged, or older women.

Why?

 "I'm too old for that shit," to paraphrase Danny Glover.

Drugs and drink suck.  Or at least I do when I'm on them.

As for random sex well I'm in love with a terrific woman and even if I wasn't anonymous sex is about as appealing to me as a Bon Jovi concert.

I guess you just outgrow some things.  Like fucking strangers and listening to Metallica records.

Also there's just a really fine line that I crossed a few years ago that separates doing something really fun and being a pathetic old bag of intoxicated bones making advances towards people born in the 80's.

I think I'm just tired from a mini-tour of the UK then a flight back to Seattle then a two day turnaround and another trip to the midwest to do the Bloomington Funny Bone.

Great club, nice people.  But I was tired.  Tired of audiences.  I can't feel their laughter anymore.

It used to feel like Heroin or a snorted Xanax when they would laugh.  Now it feels like nothing.

Like having sex with someone you've fallen out of love with.  Like a duty, a job, a fucking grind.

I'm sure this will all get better in a few days and I'll rediscover my zest for my art.

Sometimes I just wish I could be like a band and take off 5 years between albums and tours.

Wah wah wah.  I asked for my dream job and I got it.  So stop bitching, Kent.  You could still be hocking treadmills to overly-tanned bitches in the Valley.

Instead you have random drunks coming up to you, slapping you on the back and telling you, "that was fucking, funny as shit dude."

It could be worse...

 

Now You're REALLY Dating Yourself, McFederalist

Again Orwell screams at me from the pages of 1984...

"He who controls the past controls the future."

Because last night John McCain tried to rewrite basic American history again when he said this about Roe V. Wade, "I thought it was a bad decision. I think there were a lot of decisions that were bad. I think that decisions should rest in the hands of the states. I'm a Federalist."

I'm having a fucking breakdown.  I happen to be a lowly 34 year-old middle of the road stand-up comic and I know what a Federalist was.  

But apparently John Sidney McCain, the 72 year-old would be President and current senior Senator from Arizona does not.

I guess he really did skip a lot of classes at the Naval Academy.

Either that or he's trying to change the meaning of the word Federalist COMPLETELY.

See folks the Federalists were a political party, the first political party in the history of the United States.  

They held control of the Federal Government for 12 years until 1801 when Thomas Jefferson's Democratic Republicans took over in what what many call the second American revolution.

Their most famous members included such unknowns as George fucking Washington, Alexander fucking Hamilton (the first Secretary of the Treasury) and John fucking Adams (the first Vice-President and second president) among others.

John McCain should probably know this.  We're not exactly talking McKinley here.  This is common knowledge sheeyat.

The Federalists believed in a strong central government.  The idea is sort of implicit in the name - FEDERALIST.

Especially Hamilton who was the intellectual engine behind the movement.  

To use McCain-ese, my friends, Hamilton was a great American who along with James Madison and John Jay wrote many of the Federalist Papers which helped convince the country to ratify the Constitution in 1887. 

He came up with the idea of a National Bank and a unified currency throughout the states.  He nationalized the war debt in exchange for putting the capitol in Virginia.

Above all....

HE WANTED A STRONG CENTRAL GOVERNMENT.

He did not want decisions left to the states.  He was for union uber alles.

So again I am faced with deciding if McCain is either lying or stupid.

Again I ask - which is worse?

Oh well, who cares.  He will lose and soon be relegated to the pages of history with Adlai Stevenson, Hubert Humphrey and William Howard Taft.

Goodbye, McKnow nothing.  It was nice knowing you and knowing more than you.

700 Billion Worth of Prozac

I need a drink.

Because as a tax-payer I guess it's now my job to ward off the Great Depression.

Or as I call it, the deregula-pression.

Because this economic shit-storm is absolutely the result of deregulation.

See before the GOP got their greedy little hands on government there were a few teensy safeguards against this kind of thing.

They were called "regulations".

But the Republicans have adamantly insisted we must "reduce the size of government!"

Which is code for, "throw out all regulations on business, no matter how sensible or necessary!".

This ironically has led to a bigger government than we ever dreamed of in the form of a 700 billion dollar bail/buy-out.

Maybe this shows us that people who don't believe in government shouldn't be running the government.

Even more ironically this rampant, rapacious, unfettered capitalism has now become socialism of the worst kind.

Because we are socializing ownership of failing mortgage and insurance companies, banks and other financial institutions.

In other words we are socializing risks (for fat-cats) and privatizing profits.

So when everything is riding high it's, "Hey, get the government out of the way!" but when it all goes to shit it's, "Um, do you have 700 billion I could borrow?".

My answer to them is the same I used to give to the crack addicts outside my apartment in Hollywood every night.

"Fuck off and get a real job."

Folks it's hard to sum up all the factors that have lead us exactly to where we are today.

But I can try.

Here's my take and I'll try and keep it as simple as possible.

First the laws on credit were relaxed to a point where anybody could get a loan.

ANYBODY.

Interest rates were also kept artificially low (paging Mr. Greenspan) to ward off inflation.

This facilitated the handing out of risky loans to risky people.

Second the Glass-Steagall act of 1933 was repealed by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999. The former prevented banks from offering investment, commercial banking, and insurance services all at once. The latter allowed them to consolidate into a single institution.

Basically it allowed them to take FDIC insured deposits and then speculate with that money.

Your money.

As of 1999 they could now take your hard-earned $ and not only hand out risky mortgages, they could also buy risky mortgage securities and then insure other risky mortgages, thus taking insurance premiums every month and hoping the piper never had to be paid.

Does that sound like three times the risk to you? Well it is.

All with your $.

Folks this is what we call deregulation. This is what we call a bad idea.

For this brilliant change in law you can thank Phil Gramm - McCain's chief economic advisor.

I'd blame Clinton too but he was facing a veto-proof majority in the Senate so what option did he have?

All of this eventually led to a housing boom in which the market was artificially inflated by speculators flipping houses for huge profits in an artificially short period of time.

This also led to lower-level mortgage salesmen and re-fi shysters getting people approved for mortgages they couldn't afford by telling them that surely they'd be able to re-fi when the time came because the market would obviously keep going up and up and up in an artificially short period of time and their house would be surely be worth more than when they bought it in an artificially short period of time.

The mortgage companies and banks then took these bad loans and did two things.

First they repackaged them as securities to sell on Wall Street (thus the downfall of Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch, etc.).

Second they insured them with folks like AIG who kept on insuring them because they thought, "Hey, these premiums are free money because of course houses will keep going up in value in an artificially short period of time.

Since the debt to asset ratio of 15 to 1 had been removed (by more awesome deregulation!) this was all possible.

See you no longer had to have a reasonable amount of capital no matter how much debt you took on.

This model of profit-making was all predicated on one thing - PEOPLE WHO COULDN'T AFFORD THEIR MORTGAGE WOULD SOMEHOW BE ABLE TO AFFORD THEIR MORTGAGE.

If that sounds shifty to you that's because it is.

Essentially the banks, the re-fi people and such all gambled that the value of homes would keep going up forever thus allowing people to refinance every few years or whenever interest rates were raised.

Goodbye old model of buying a home you can afford and living in it for 30 years.

Hello buying a house out of your means in the hope you will be able to re-fi and re-fi and re-fi again!

Hello buying a house on an interest-only loan and selling it for a 100K profit in three months!

Obviously this had to come to an end.

It has.

Now they want 700 billion to bail them out.

I don't want to give it to them because, hey, this is the free market at work.

Also I'm in Vegas right now. If I put my life savings on one hand of blackjack and lose should I expect the government to help me?

Of course not. Because I'm gambling and that's all Wall Street really is.

Gambling with a nice suit on.

I don't know if denying a bail-out will lead to another depression or not.

All I know is my parents are probably going to move in with me.

Which means we'll all be living in a Honda Civic Hybrid.

Anybody got a Xanax?

Obama Wants to Teach 5 Year-Olds How to F**k

Hey, kids, "H" is for herpes!!!

So Obama, when he was in the state legislatiure in Illinois, voted in committee to teach age-appropriate sex-ed to kindergartners.

Which basically would have involved giving them lessons on what was inappropriate touching and how to avoid sexual predators.

Now the McCain campaign is running an ad that basically accuses Obama of wanting to teach little kids how to fuck.

Don't believe me? Watch this...


This is of course easily debunkable...

Debunking link! Read Here!

So much for the honorable straight talkin' flyboy Johnny McCain.

What we've got now is a pol who's sucking so hard on demon dick you're gonna need pliars to get his dentures off when he's done.

Which, going on the tenor of his campaign so far should be right around November 5 when he's (hopefully) giving his concession speech while simultaneously gargling Listerine in a vain attempt to get the taste of devil semen out of his old, lying mouth.

Family is Frustrating

I have a family problem.

Without naming names...

One of my female family members won't vote for Obama because, as she says "He's a muslim."

This is easily disprovable but she refuses to look into it.

A male family member is Catholic and pro-life so he won't vote for Obama either.

Of course he ignores the fact that the Pope is virulently against the Iraq war and the death penalty.

2 things John McCain is a cheerleader for.

So apparently my misguided relative thinks it's OK to kill babies as long as they're inside the bodies of living Iraqi women.

BTW - he also thinks that the Democrats sabotaged Sarah Palin's teleprompter during her speech at the RNC.

And no, he's not on crystal meth.

That I know of.

See it wouldn't bother me if my family folk opposed Obama based on even the tiniest grain of truth or perhaps a thoughtful dissent involving policy.

But they don't. They buy into the Hannity, Limbaugh, GOP lie machine without using the critical thinking skills I am so sure they possess.

These thoughts by my kin strike me as close-minded, ignorant and less than vaguely racist.

I can't be friends with people like that anymore, no matter how much DNA we share.

I can't hang out with people who put all their faith in Jesus and not in facts.

I just don't have anything in common with them other than we sort of look alike.

Bummer.

Country First?

John McCain might die.

He is 72 and a four time cancer survivor.

There is a real chance he could be incapacitated in some manner causing (gulp!) Sarah Palin to become acting President of the United States.

Or as the job is otherwise known - THE MOST POWERFUL PERSON IN THE FREE WORLD.

As I've been reading, listening, watching and learning about Governor Palin this prospect becomes increasingly frightening.

It is also becomes increasingly obvious that McCain made a nakedly political choice when he picked Palin to be his running mate.

Because Palin is a an early Christmas gift to the hard right, bible-thumping, rapture-believing section of the GOP.

They love that she thinks Iraq is a mission from God (what is she, a Blues Brother?) and that she wants a woman who is raped and becomes pregnant to be forced to carry her rapist's child in her belly for 9 months.

They don't care that she is clearly not up to speed on national or international issues. They don't care that in a crashing economy she doesn't realize Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are public institutions. They just care that she is waaay into automatic weapons and rape-spawned fetuses.

So much for putting country first, John. This time country finished a few laps behind winning.

If McCain wanted to pick a woman he could have picked Kay Bailey Hutchison or Olympia Snow or Condoleeza Rice. All women who are much more qualified than Palin.

But he didn't.

I find it ironic that for the last 4 months McCain has been saying Obama is "not ready to lead" over and over and over.

But now he nominates a woman who has a resume thinner than Kate Moss.

So for the last 4 months McCain's campaign either didn't mean what they said or they were lying.

How can I tell the Palin pick wouldn't hold up to serious scrutiny you may ask?

Simple. Watch the way the McCain campaign is handling her.

They are in the process of managing Palin's rollout with the kind of thoughtfulness you wish they had put into the decision to go to war in Iraq.

She has been cut off from the kind of press conferences, Sunday morning talk-show appearances and other interviews that all candidates for Veep have been subjected to since the advent of Television.

She has agreed to only two interviews. Two! How many has Biden done? Hell Obama eveen went on the O'Reilly Factor! Do you think Palin or McCain will go on Countdown with Keith Olbermann any time soon?

Hell no.

Palin has been so shut off from any kind of spontaneous media contact you'd think she was a member of a jury in a high-profile murder case instead of a candidate for Vice President.

So why do it? Why would the McCain camp need to protect her from the media if she was truly qualified? Why would they keep her behind a curtain of silence and safety if she knew her stuff?

The answer is she has been sequestered because she knows jack-shit about national issues.

Think about it.

That's why the Charlie Gibson interview took place over a series of days in Palin's hometown.

Because they wanted to turn what should have been an in-depth discussion of policy into a "personality profile".

My God, what would happen if she had to go on Meet the Press or Face the Nation?

She would look like a fool. She came across as a fool half the time when Gibson lobbed her softballs.

Actually Gibson did better than I thought he would. I give him a B minus.

Highlights of the piece included her not knowing what the Bush Doctrine was and segueing the question about her national security credentials into a diatribe about how she knows energy.

Yeah, news flash. It's not hard to be an energy expert in Alaska since the oil is everywhere and also state-owned.

What that has to do with the Iraq war, Iranian nuclear ambitions or a resurgent Russia I'm not sure but it's the answer she gave.

Also she repeated the ridiculous line that she has foreign policy cred because "Alaska is close to Russia." In fact according to her you can "see Russian territory" from Alaska.

Awesome. I can see a bathroom from where I'm sitting right now. Does that make me a proctologist?

When she said that I simultaneously laughed, wept, then screamed "you stupid whore" at the top of my lungs and threw a bunch of shit at the TV.

So you can't say she's not an inspiring speaker!

Folks, it may be a travesty and a perversion of the democratic process, but for now the Gibson interview will have to stand as Palin's audition with the American people.

Because that's all we're going to get. One tiny interview with the woman who wants to be THE MOST POWERFUL PERSON IN THE FREE WORLD.

Oh, I forgot! She'll be talking soon with Sean Hannity. I'm sure that will be a tough set of questions.

Let's play a drinking game with the Hannity interview. Every time he mentions how she's been subjected to sexism or unfair treatment by the media you have to take a shot.

I imagine you'll be drunker than Winston Churchill before the interview is 5 minutes old.

You know, if she didn't want to be "subjected to unfair treatment" she could always GO ON A SUNDAY MORNING TALK SHOW or, Heaven forbid, TALK OFTEN AND OPENLY WITH THE MEDIA.

But that ain't gonna happen.

Because she isn't up to the task of talking openly to the media without looking like a completely unqualified and uninformed PTA mom who wants to be THE MOST POWERFUL PERSON IN THE FREE WORLD.

So much for country first, McCain.

As Obama said, I guess you'd "rather lose your integrity than lose an election."

Have You Ever Been Executive Experienced?

So the GOP keeps touting the fact that Sarah Palin has more "executive experience" than Barack Obama.

Of course they leave out the fact that she also has more executive experience than John McCain.

But what does executive experience mean? That you had employees?

Christ she was mayor of Wasilla, AK. A 7,000 person town and the governor for 20 months of the 4th smallest state in the union.

She is also under investigation for abuse of power and was almost recalled as mayor in a firing scandal.

Well I used to manage a sporting goods store. I had some employees under me and I never even got a write-up!

Can I be President now?

Fumbling the Hand-Off

Yaaaaay! We handed over the Anbar province!!!! According to the right-wing the war is almost over!

Right? Right?

Sort of.

Not really.

No.

From the Washington Post...

"...as Iraqis celebrated the milestone, uncertainty lingered about the future of a linchpin in the effort to secure Anbar and the rest of Iraq: the Awakening movement, a 100,000-person group of former Sunni insurgents who now cooperate with U.S. troops.

The Shiite-led government has recently stepped up a campaign to arrest leaders of the Awakening and dismantle parts of the program, whose members receive $300 a month from the U.S. military. Many fighters have abandoned their posts and fled their homes to avoid detention, stoking fears that some will rejoin the insurgency."

So we leave and the Shiite government starts arresting the people who fought al-Qaeda in Iraq for us.

Sounds like stable democracy to me!

From USA Today...

"...approximately 25,000 U.S. Marines stationed in Anbar will remain for now, but they will run fewer patrols and function largely in a supporting role for Iraqi security forces."

So we're handing it over. But we're still running patrols and keeping 25,000 troops there.

Is that really "handing it over"? 25,000 US troops is a lotta guns, bullets and boots in the area.

Doesn't sound like a hand-over in any sense of the word except symbolically saying, "Here ya go. Arrest our former allies without cause and we won't stop you. Do what you want! However if things get out of hand we have 25,000 fucking death-bringers ready to go at a moment's notice. So enjoy your sovereignty! For now!"

What Republican Really Think About Sarah Palin

The Vagina Card

A quote from McCain campaign spokeswoman Carly Fiorina (the FIRED CEO of Hewlett Packard)...

"Because of Hillary Clinton's historic run for the Presidency and the treatment she received, American women are more highly tuned than ever to recognize and decry sexism in all its forms. They will not tolerate sexist treatment of Governor Palin."

REALLY, BITCH?

This is not only a blatant (ineffective) pander to dissafected Hillary voters it is also a ridiculous distortion of what is going on.

The fact is the Obama campaign hasn't said anything all that horrible about Sarah Palin other than to lightly point out that she is VASTLY INEXPERIENCED.

Other than that they've been fairly hands off. The media hasn't been overly in attack-mode either although they're doing their usual light-news job with a new figure on the scene.
Honestly there are things the press could be going after with both barrells blazing right now and we'll see if they will in the coming days.

But as for now reporters are in a wait and see mode. There is no mention of gender at all as far as I've seen in ANY criticizm of Palin.

Also let me point out that the McCain camp doesn't have any qualms talking about Obama's experience vs. McCains's when it suits their purposes.

Did they do this because he was black?

Probably not.

Probably they thought it was a winning strategy. Or maybe they even think it's true.

So if Obama or the media go after Palin please don't pull the va-jay-jay card. People in public life get shots taken at them regardless of what is between their legs.

Christ, it's not like Obama said, "Fuck that bitch. She gonna be too emotional to run this bizness, bleeding all over the Oval Office rug once a month and shit.

Anyway there are plenty of Palin things to talk about that have nothing to do with her gender:

1. Troopergate
2. Almost recalled as mayor of her 7,000 person town.
3. Wants to teach creationism.
4. Doesn't believe climate change is man-made.
5. Thinks the Iraq war is a mission from God.
6. Is anti-choice in cases of rape or incest.
7. My 17 year-old whore daughter fucked a hockey-player dueschebag without a rubber-gate.

None of these have anything to do with whether she has an innie or an outie down there.

So Carly, shut the fuck up and go back to screwing up companies. You dumb girl.

Radically Pro-F**king

Wow, the GOP is really progressive.

I mean they nominated a woman! For Vice-President!!! In 2008!

Which is about 24 years after the Democrats did it.

Yawn.

This may be the most cynical VP pick I've ever seen.

I mean what's the strategy here?

Does McCain actually expect to peel off a significant amount of women voters just because he nominated the former runner-up to Ms. Alaska?

Does John McCain really think women are that stupid?

I guess the obvious answer is YES - JOHN MCCAIN REALLY THINKS WOMEN ARE THAT STUPID.

Otherwise you have to wonder why did he pick her? Was Palin truly the best person for the job?

No. Most likely he nominated her because she has a vagina.

And here I thought Republicans were against affirmative action.

I know some of you are thinking this is a ground-breaking pick. This is a chance to "shatter that glass ceiling once and for all!".

But please slow down for a mo and allow me to point out that while Sarah Palin is most certainly a woman (and therefore in my mind has the chance to be the most fuckable Vice-President ever) she is also anti-choice, pro-gun, pro big oil, opposes stem-cell research, wants to teach creationism in schools, tried to ban books at the local library, also has ZERO FOREIGN POLICY EXPERTISE and is currently the first term governor of Alaska - a state which has a population smaller than the cast of Lost.

Before that she was the mayor of a town with 7,000 people. There are bigger high schools than that.

All of which brings too mind that watchword of the last month - experience.

After all isn't that why Obama has been painted by McCain as such an overwhelmingly DANGEROUS pick - because he was a first-term Senator with so little "experience"?

I guess that argument is off the table now that John - death is not only knockin' at my door but ringing the Goddamn doorbell - McCain has nominated someone who is younger than Obama and has fewer foreign policy credentials than my left testicle.

In fact Palin has said she's "not that interested" in foreign policy. So that's promising. I'm sure Vladimir Putin is trembling in his boots thinking about going toe to toe with the former runner-up to Ms. Alaska who is "not that interested" in foreign policy.

Great choice, John!

Also Palin said her favorite meal is Moose Stew.

Ew. I take back what I said about her being fuckable.

Alsthough Governor Palin does have 5 kids which means she has definitely been fucked at some point.

So that's at least one thing I have in common with this Republican harpie.

We are both pro-fucking!

Of course Palin is against abortion in all cases INCLUDING RAPE AND INCEST.

So in Sarah Palin's world if you're dad fucks you, then you become pregnant and for some crazy reason want to get an abortion well... you're fucked.

OK I totally take back what I said about being pro-fucking. I am now moderately pro-fucking while Sarah Palin is rabidly pro-fucking in all cases INCLUDING RAPE AND INCEST.

Speaking of which, I'm looking forward to Joe Biden ripping her a new one in the debate.

And then fucking her in it.

Hee hee.

Maybe the runner-up to Ms. Alaska is hoping there's a talent portion to the event.

Hee hee again.

Here's another thought - Sarah Palin - the zero foreign policy experience Vice-Presidential nominee to a 72 year-old four time Melanoma surivor - also has 5 kids, one of whom is a baby.

So there is a very good chance that if she's elected Palin will be changing diapers for two gwumpy widdle boys.

By the way if you vote for McCain just because his running mate has a twat you are dumber than a pot of moose stew.


One last observation - Andrea Mitchell's facelift makes her look like the Joker in the 1988 "Batman" movie.