Five Before Chaos

Yes, as you first watch this and have to put up with the really bad theme song, you’ll probably be thinking WTF? But it’s freakin’ hilarious. Enjoy.

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Well, that was a lot more wonky than I thought it would be, surprisingly run quite well by Lehrer, compared to the “Where’s your flag pin?” nonsense we’ve become accustomed to. McCain did not look well, as though he was still stewing over his ridiculous “campaign suspension” nonsense and the fact that most people saw it for what it was: a stunt. I think he was pissed that he couldn’t weasel out of it. I was waiting to hear him say he didn’t have to debate because he was a POW or something.

Nevertheless, Obama has a new ad out pointing out how McCain never used the term “middle class” once during the debate.

Curiously enough, nobody’s put out an ad mentioning that neither one of them mentioned “poor Americans” or “poverty” in the entire debate. The focus always seems to be on the middle class who are entering the ranks of the poor. Nada about the people who already there, or the ones who have always been there.

And that reminds me of my thoughts on the last night of the DNC in Denver, when I was on the last bus of the evening, missed my stop, and had to ride it for another half hour until it came back around. I saw a lot of people sleeping on bus stop benches, a profound contrast to the spectacle of the convention. Come to think of it (and someone correct me if I’m wrong), I don’t ever remember “poverty” or “poor people” mentioned there, either.

One of those fine Americans not worthy of mention at last Friday’s debate

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Eh, howzabout “falls mainly on his face”? By now you’ve probably heard of McCain’s Spanish interview in which he apparently thought Spanish PM Zapatero was some Latin American leftist kook, and he didn’t even seem to understand that Spain wasn’t in Latin America. He’s either confused as his aging synapses continue to deteriorate, or he’s just so conditioned by the neocons to react that way toward anyone with a Latino-sounding last name.

Or perhaps he feels Palin is beating him in the cluelessness/stupidity department, and he’s striking back, his gooey POW manliness threatened. I’d like to say that these two are making Bush look like Mensa material. Palin, perhaps is already there, but at this rate McCain’s not far behind.

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I just have to chime in on this “McCain invented the Blackberry” nonsense that’s making its way around the liberal blogosphere. Now, yeah, I get it, it’s funny because it’s the same contextual bullshit as that “Al Gore invented the internet” nonsense back in 2000. And I guess on one level I can appreciate the fact that the Dems are finally figuring out that stupidity works better than just about anything else when reaching the American voter.

Sure, point out how McCain hasn’t been at the forefront of supporting groundbreaking technologies and hasn’t authored any law on expanding wireless technologies. I’m all for embracing their tactics, as I’ve said before, with one exception: don’t make stuff up. Am I remiss here?

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I’m tired this morning, still rendered into a temporary food coma from all the grease bombs I ate at the Tunbridge World’s Fair last night (where, I might add, all four of Jenni’s flower entries won ribbons, two blue and two red). As the grease works its way out of my system, lemme share with you some excerpts from a rather funny guest contribution I found over at Buzzflash this morning about White Privilege:

For those who still can’t grasp the concept of white privilege, or who are constantly looking for some easy-to-understand examples of it, perhaps this list will help.

White privilege is when you can get pregnant at seventeen like Bristol Palin and everyone is quick to insist that your life and that of your family is a personal matter, and that no one has a right to judge you or your parents, because “every family has challenges,” even as black and Latino families with similar “challenges” are regularly typified as irresponsible, pathological and arbiters of social decay.

White privilege is when you can call yourself a “fuckin’ redneck,” like Bristol Palin’s boyfriend does, and talk about how if anyone messes with you, you’ll “kick their fuckin’ ass,” and talk about how you like to “shoot shit” for fun, and still be viewed as a responsible, all-American boy (and a great son-in-law to be) rather than a thug.

White privilege is when you can attend four different colleges in six years like Sarah Palin did (one of which you basically failed out of, then returned to after making up some coursework at a community college), and no one questions your intelligence or commitment to achievement, whereas a person of color who did this would be viewed as unfit for college, and probably someone who only got in in the first place because of affirmative action.

White privilege is when you can claim that being mayor of a town smaller than most medium-sized colleges, and then Governor of a state with about the same number of people as the lower fifth of the island of Manhattan, makes you ready to potentially be president, and people don’t all piss on themselves with laughter, while being a black U.S. Senator, two-term state Senator, and constitutional law scholar, means you’re “untested.”

And so on… It’s interesting how the MSM is actually starting to do its job and point out that McPalin is lying. I really don’t know what to make of it, what the motivation is behind it, or how long it will last. It’s just nice to see the media do what its supposed to do, for a change.

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Here’s the kind of ad you should see on tv, that the GOP would have no problem putting on, but Dems can’t seem to get in touch with their “inner asshole” and put out there. Pass it on:

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Consider this a caption contest. Have at it, boys and girls. The fact that I watched George A. Romero’s latest zombie flick last night has nothing to do with this, I swear.

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I just have to laugh at the incessant whining from the McCain campaign, about how “the media loves Obama”. Is Obama getting more minutes on the news? I don’t doubt that, as what he’s doing lately does make for a more newsworthy story, regardless of the political persuasion (first major presidential candidate of color repeatedly bucking the odds and generating lots of enthusiasm, most lately on his Middle East trip vs. stodgy old fart with flappy cheeks who’s one minute away from crapping his drawers, getting everything wrong so quickly you can’t keep score anymore).

Plus, with all that extra media coverage of Obama, don’t forget how many non-story/inflated b.s. sensationalist stuff was in that coverage… Rev. Wright, Bittergate, a bad bowler who just can’t relate to the hicks in Appalachia, etc.

The press, with all of McCain’s whining is still his “base”, and as he continuously goes more and more off the deep end into some factually-challenged twighlight zone, we’re seeing them actually cover up for him. This makes the press coverage of Bush in 2000 that downplayed he had the intelligence of a fourth grader look like nothing, by comparison. How perverted is it getting?  McCain completely screwed up his facts regarding the timelines of the surge and events surrounding it. CBS actually went ahead and cut out his horribly mangled answer and inserted the answer to a different question. Yeah, you just can’t make this stuff up, I tells ya’. Your ‘liberal’ media at work:

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Jeeeezus, I don’t show my face for a few days around here and y’all keep coming back anyways. Seriously, what’s wrong with you people?

All kidding aside, it might be a bit light around here in the coming weeks,as I’m in crunch time with grad school, got the wedding, the Dem Convention, and am finishing up the house addition as well as putting on a deck. It’s endless, I tells ya. Endless. But I appreciate you all coming here, I really do.

Speaking of the Dem Convention, you’ve probably heard by now that Obama’s giving his acceptance speech in a football stadium, ensuring I will get absolutely no good photographs from the event. Rumor has it that John McCain is considering something similar, but so far, the only thing he can come up with is some little-league field with a few bleachers.

And now, some random madness of marginal interest for you, in the form of the late German actor Klaus Kinski. Kinski was an enormously talented, but rather insane artist.  I first saw him in the numerous spaghetti westerns he starred in in the 60’s but he had quite the career apart form that. He did some rather fine films with German director Werner Herzog, such as Aguirre, the Wrath of God, where he played an insanely intense and evil conquistador.

What was strange about Kinski is that he’d act in some seriously artistic endeavors, and then turn around and act in a Z-grade film, just collecting a paycheck, unabashedly. Rumour has it that Steven Spielberg approached him to have a part in Raiders of the Lost Ark. He declined, saying something along the lines that nobody would be interested in that film, and then went on to act in Venom, a horrendous cinematic pile of shit about a guy that kills people with snakes. But it paid more than Raiders.

And he was a megalomaniac, prone to batshit insane temper tantrums at the drop of a hat, as you can see in this clip from Werner Herzog’s Klaus Kinski: My Best Fiend, his documentary about their turbulent relationship, in which the both of them had actually plotted to kill each other.  This was some footage from the filming of Fitzcarraldo:

The Indians in the film that he’s stressing out actually approached Herzog afterward and offered to kill Kinksi.  Good times. Kinski was definitely an enigma, an incredibly talented, unabashed prick, but if you’re a fan of Eurocinema, he’s unavoidable.  Somehow I supsect this is the first blog post in the history of blogdom that mentions Kinski and Obama in the same post.

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Well, sort of.  I’m sure he’ll be getting an Atari 2600 pretty soon to pass the time away on the Straight Talk Express.

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