However Dumb You Think Sarah Palin Is...

...you're probably underestimating her. Her stupidity, I mean.

"If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations," Palin told host Chris Plante, "then I don't know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media."

Note to Self: What Is PayPal Trying to Say?

Dear Dave: figure out what the hell Paypal is trying to tell you. My first read of this message was inconclusive. So were efforts 2 through 17.

PayPal improves protection for eBay sellers

Hello David Anderson*,

PayPal recently launched some fantastic
improvements to Seller Protection for items purchased on eBay. You should have
received an email from us describing these improvements.

Unfortunately, this email incorrectly states that it's now easier than ever to be covered against items-significantly-not-as-described and items-not-received claims, chargebacks, and reversals. To clarify, the email should have said it's now easier than ever to be covered against unauthorized payments and items-not-received claims, chargebacks, and reversals. Our improved Seller Protection does not extend coverage to items-significantly-not-as-described claims, chargebacks, and reversals.

Here's what I want to know: what is the difference between an item that's "not-received" and an item that's "significantly-not-as-described"? If you buy something based on a description that doesn't match the item, then you didn't get what you bought, right? Also: precisely what is "improved"? Feel free to check my work, but I'm confident that "chargebacks" and "reversals" are in all three sentences in that paragraph. Figuring that out is what the colors were for.

*David Anderson might be a more anonymous name than John Smith. There are about 12,000 David or Dave Andersons nationwide, according to the number that I only semi-pulled out of my ass just now.

John Cleese on Bill O'Reilly

Bill O'Reilly's "No Spin Zone"
is rated highly by his own
beloved mother, but...no other

Except that Bill, for all his faults,
still has one skill (a skill of sorts):
he can amuse a true dumb ox
the dullest crayon in the box
the kind of ox that watches Fox

and Bill will pander to this group
with propaganda, right-wing poop,
and knee-jerk views:
his sense of news

thus Bill O'Reilly earns his crust
behaving vilely, as he must
he will not shirk from Rupert's work
he really is a perfect berk

- John Cleese

See his appearance on Olbermann's show here. He has other amusing things to say.
Btw - "berk" is cockney rhyming slang for "cunt" by way of "Berkeley/Berkshire Hunt".

Don't Count Your Chickens Before They're Hacked

I made a mistake. In my last post, I made a reference to "President Obama". That was presumptuous, I know -- although every poll indicates a McCain victory is an electoral impossibility. Trouble with real-world analysis is that it leaves out the possibility of fraud.

I always knew that the 2004 election was just as -- if not more -- fraudulent as the 2000 one, but it looks like I was wrong about how the fraud was perpetrated. I always figured that the fraud had everything to do with aggressive vote suppression efforts, like making long lines in left-leaning precincts, or rejecting voter registrations for being on the wrong paper stock, or not counting millions of provisional ballots. Stuff like that.

Turns out, the theft may have been much more overt, direct, and simple:

Reviewing documents provided by the Ohio Attorney General that show the system architecture four- and two-years ago, Spoonamore said his analysis now, as it was then, confirms his conclusion that a kingpin attack to flip votes from Kerry to Bush had been set up by SmartTech -- hired by then-Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, a conservative, Evangelical Republican who co-chaired the Ohio Bush/Cheney campaign.
...
Spoonamore, whose data security company services world-wide clients like MasterCard, said other experts in voting and statistics claim it's "impossible...1 in a Billion" to believe that tens of thousands voted for an extremely liberal minority judge -- Democrat C. Ellen Connally -- who had done no campaigning in the county -- but cast no vote for Kerry.

MotherFuck! Check out that whole article.

Updated: And another.

The "Bailout": Salve or Salvo?

You best be listening to Naomi Klein. I've never known her to be wrong.

"...every day it becomes clearer that the bailout was sold on false pretenses. It was never about getting loans flowing. It was always about turning the state into a giant insurance agency for Wall Street -- a safety net for the people who need it least, subsidized by the people who need it most."

The whole article is here.

A couple of years ago the New York Times published a pair of editorials called "A Look at Republican Priorities", one subtitled "Comforting the Comfortable", the other "Afflicting the Afflicted." Sadly, after two years of a Democratic majority in Congress (did you know that? it's true! hard to tell, I know), the editorials are even more true today than they were then. That $900 million tax cut for timber companies seems aw-shucks cute by today's standards.

President Obama has one hell of an uphill climb ahead of him. He's going to need a lot of pushes -- not only to help him up that hill, but also to keep him pointed in the right direction.

Given the wildly radical nature of the damage that's been done during the Bush/Cheney years, let no possible solution be rejected as too radical to consider.

Maybe John McCain Actually Is a Hero

Seeing some clips of John McCain campaigning got me thinking: what if he's actually a selfless American Hero? What if McCain loved his country so much, that he has orchestrated every detail of his campaign against Barack Obama in order to break the back of the Republican Party? Maybe he chose Sarah Palin because he knew that she would be cartoonishly divisive. Maybe he says the things he says, then says the opposite because he is so selfless that he's willing to besmirch his own reputation and welcome scorn for the sake of driving a stake through the heart of a broken system.

It's an appealing hypothesis for many reasons. You've got to respect self-sacrifice, it makes seeing McCain speak less painful, and the schadenfreude from the ticking Republican self-destruct sequence, to name but a few.

I've decided, if possible, to go ahead and believe that about McCain. Perhaps it will help make me feel a little less like crawling out of my own skin while waiting for this damned election to be over.

Yes, You are Still Losing the Class War

People who vote for McCain are people who have always voted for this kind of thing:

U.S. banks getting more than $163 billion from the Treasury Department for new lending are on pace to pay more than half of that sum to their shareholders, with government permission, over the next three years.

Trouble is, most of them have no idea that's what they're actually supporting. They think they're supporting 'freedom' and 'reform' and whatever is the opposite of abortionist socialist and lots of other -ists that would make them gay if they could name.

Where's Barack Obama on this issue? If he wants to be President, he should be taking charge. Democrats have a majority in Congress, so why can't they keep strings attached to all our money?

Treasury officials say that suspending quarterly dividend payments would have deterred banks from participating in the voluntary program.

Got that? The government needed to give these banks our money (or our kids' and grandkids' money, really) so they could lend to each other, thus helping to save the economy -- and the banks themselves. Think of it as economic K-Y jelly, in a time of hard-core fiscal ass-fucking. But they didn't insist the money be used wisely because--you read it right--they were afraid that some of the banks wouldn't want to be saved. So instead of being used to keep the friction from elevating to a far more painful burn, banks are taking the (borrowed) cash from the Treasury and handing it over to the dipshits who put the banks into the vulnerable positions they're in. If you think I'm wrong, then explain to me shareholder responsibility. Do shareholders not elect corporate officers?

In case you're not pissed off yet, check this out:

Several banks are on pace to pay more in dividends than they get from the government. The Bank of New York Mellon got $3 billion from the government on Tuesday. It will pay out $275 million to shareholders this quarter, and a projected $3.3 billion over the next three years. A spokesman declined to comment.

That's the Republican Party in a nutshell right there. The Democratic Party in a nutshell? Sit back, watch, and just hope that the other side chokes in its own gluttony. "Oh, that's a lot of money. Maybe they'll break their backs carrying it away."

But you're not like the rest of them, are you Sen. Obama? I know you're ahead, but here's yet another chance to drive a bigger wedge between the inhabitants of fantasyland and the grown-ups.

I say that knowing you'll do nothing before the election but smile and wait.

Per Versification

Okay, retards. Listen:

I understand that many of you dipshits think gay marriage is just abominable. We can agree to disagree about that, and eventually your perspective will wither and die away like so many other outdated bigotries. But understand this: just because you don't want gay people getting married doesn't mean you should banish them from society. If the imbeciles who made this video had a gay friend, they could've done a LOT better with the lyrics.

"Oh my gosh, SOS
I'd be lost and darn confused
if my dad is a woman
or my mom is a man
yes on Proposition 8"

Are you kidding me? You use a children's song and don't bother to rhyme anything? For fuck's sake -- I may not be a gay, but I'm sure I can do better than that!

Try this on for size:

Oh my gosh! SOS!
How did marriage become such a great big mess?
If men marry men
And the same goes for girls,
However can their weddings be blessed?

That's just off the top of my head.

There's plenty of boring, garden-variety fag-bashing out there, people. If you're going to make a contribution, put a little heart into it, will ya?

Undecided Voters, Take II

A local radio station has been pursuing the undecided voters of this election relentlessly, asking for their opinions after debates, speeches and news events. In the eyes of the media, the undecided voter is the most sought after and purest form of voter - an electoral mirror that merely reflects what Americans at large are thinking at any point in time. They pop up in nearly any public conversation on this election cycle, telling us about their feelings and what makes them undecided. They speak, and those of us who have decided listen, hoping that they'll say something comforting and indicate that they're coming to our side.

Anyway, this particular radio station had a program this morning where undecided voters would call in and tell us about why they're undecided. The refrain is familiar to anyone keeping an eye on the news, mostly a bunch of mushy nonsense about still not being sure, they may wait until they're in the voting booth, and how they don't know enough to make a decision. At this point the host says something thoughtful, like "Interesting," and then asks an expert on his take is on the undecided voter's words.

What's puzzling to me, and probably puzzling to most people who listen to programs like this, is why we're pretending that undecided voters have anything of interest to say to the rest of the world about this election. We're probably better divining the mysteries of the universe from a sack of mewling kittens, or quizzing infants on the current economic crisis. People are undecided voters for one of three reasons:

1. they're intensely stupid human beings with no capacity for intellectual curiosity,
2. they genuinely have no ability to make a decision on their own, relying on the feelings they get when they hear someone talk, or
3. they're divas, reveling in the attention they and their inbred peers get every election cycle.

When thinking of this portion of the population, here's some advice quoted from an earlier conversation on the topic:

Regarding the undecideds, you have to keep in mind that you're talking about the most weak-spined, critical-thinking deficient adults in American society. How they manage to make the choice on Election Day to drive down to the polling station instead of buying a bagel is a puzzle to me. Maybe they forgo a decision on what they'll wear that morning and just wear yesterday's clothes. We're talking about people who change their candidate of choice based on who they heard speak last. These people number in the millions, and are apparently so dim that they cannot put together a few simple facts to come to a solid conclusion. They're Buddha-like still stones in the water, reflecting back only what comes to them. They are, in fact, fucking morons, and I have even less respect for them than the Repbulitard jackasses that are only interested in scraping the earth clean of life so they can live a few more years in relative comfort.

Harsh? Maybe, but the fate of our country - and, in many ways, the world - is in the hands of people who literally change their opinions from week to week based on their precious emotions. It's like having toddlers running the election; if you hurt their feelings, they'll punish everyone in a planet-sized tantrum.

The next time you listen in on a conversation about undecided voters, keep in mind that you're listening to a conversation about people who are so unserious about our country's future that they haven't read (or don't care about) the position papers of the candidates. Many just watch the commercials, tune in to a debate, or get their brains hammered into jelly by the pundits on CNN or Fox News. That's why they complain about not knowing enough - they've never actively sought out the answers to the questions they pretend to have.

If you're undecided, and have somehow managed to endure having your feeble sense of self battered by my post, here's a solution to your problem. Go to these websites:

http://www.barackobama.com/issues/

http://www.johnmccain.com/Informing/Issues/

and READ. READ WITH YOUR FUCKING EYES and see what the candidate's positions on the issues are. Compare how each candidate approaches the issue, and decide which one you agree with. When you're done reading, the one you agreed with most is the one you should vote for. That's it. It's not any more complicated than that. Also, stop watching television or listening to the radio, and don't talk to anyone about the election until it's over. And stop being such a douchebag.

You're welcome.

You Scare Me, America

You're kind of freaking me out, America. You're frightening me.

Obama is back down to a mere single-digit lead in the polls. What the hell is the matter with people?

If you can't pick up what Obama's putting down, you must truly be so far out there that you couldn't embrace a majority opinion about anything. Or you're a bigot.

If Barack Obama can't unite the US, then the US can't be united. At least not right now. Maybe in the future, after McCain/Palin has finished what Bush/Cheney started, and we are forced to band together to fight off invaders in a nationwide, small-town, guerilla war a la Red Dawn. If not with Barack Obama now, then only after we've nearly reverted to the Bronze Age will we unite as one nation.

It's all the lying, I know. I'm so liberal that I actually sympathize with you poor, foolish anti-Obama ass-people for your inability to differentiate between fact and fiction. I know that your brains are wired to accept lies, and you are therefore not fully responsible for your fear and the angers that arise from it. I know that you don't grasp irony, nor comprehend how criticism can demonstrate concern, and therefore praise. I know that metaphors elude you, and I think I even know why you regard ignorance as neither a strength nor a weakness. (It's because, my theory goes, these ass-people of whom I speak inherently comprehend a contradiction in the position that a greater good can came of forming laws while seeking to protect individual liberty.)

I understand all that--or at least think that I do (which is about the same thing, because as soon as you learn that you don't understand something, you understand it better).

What I do not understand is why that single-digit lead isn't well into the double-digits. Fifty-two percent? 52?! That's pathetic! Come ON, America!

How is it not clear, even to a nitwit, that rich people stole your home equity, your 401(k)s, your grandkids' futures, and cornered the government into a position of having to take even more of your money to fix the problems caused by the first string of thefts?!

How is it not abundantly clear, even to an ignoranus, that a vote for John "the fundamentals of our economy are strong" McCain is a vote for the very people who robbed all of us and are laughing at us right now, as they convene in luxury hotels, spending our grandchildren's money on trivialities?

If everyone in the US were educated, self-aware, and sober enough to comprehend what is or is not in his or her own best interests, then, by my calculations, John McCain's support would total just under two percent. But, because so many Americans are stupid, asleep, or drunk on money, God, or booze or other drugs, John "not even my running mate will listen to me" McCain seemingly manages to gather the support of over 40% of the electorate. So at least 38% of us, of Americans, are hopeless idiot shitheads. That should come as no surprise. I'd have put it at more like 80%+, but come to think of it, nearly half of Americans are too damn dumb to vote, so there.

The only reason (other than bigotry, which is great fun to put in parentheses) Barack Obama isn't ahead by 20 points, I am convinced, is that Democrats can't seem to turn innocuous things into obscenities the way Republicans can. Proud words like "liberal" and helpful words like "socialist" are honed into weapons by Republicans with their snarling repetition. Yet when the record demonstrates so vividly that Republicans are good for nothing more than spectacular failures, one seemingly more colossal than the last, Democrats can't seem to capitalize upon it. It's the political equivalent of having a massive, fully automatic machine gun and nobody who knows how to turn off the safety. If somebody did, that scary part of America could be rolled up and put away.

Don't be a Dork

There aren't any calculations. Figure it out yourself. What proportion of the population benefits from things being the way they are? Factor in the economy, the war, all of it. If you come up with more than 2%, you're terrible at math.