H. L. Mencken

Did you know that the Arkansas legislature passed a motion back in 1931 to pray for H. L. Mencken’s soul? Yes, they did and it was damn nice of them (do legislatures still do this anymore?) Surely, they thought, if anyone were destined for Hell it was Mencken. If you’re looking for some quick and condensed info on Mencken this page is pretty good.

It’s downright astonishing just how much of H.L. Mencken’s writings hold up today.  It just goes to show that the cynical mind, when put to paper, stays crisp and clear through the ages. Of course some allowances have to be made, especially in the way of long forgotten place names. But names, as they represent characters (politicians, celebrities, writers…) are interchangeable. The witty and cynical Mencken knew that human nature has held pretty steady, all the way back to, say when Cro-Magnon man tossed his first spear at a fish. Yes, the politicians of ancient Rome were as tricky-dicky as they are today, and will be tomorrow.

Menken had a superb analytic tool at his disposal. It was a tool that penetrated the fog of idealism and the stifling stickiness of social tradition and religion. It was the great scoffing tool itself. Let’s call it the cynical scythe. He made mincemeat of boldfaced idealistic human intention, commonly called human engineering, and turned Quixotism to jaundice in just a few well turned phrases. He exposed the high sounding words of politicians and religious kingpins into the cheap platitudes they were.

He uprooted the assertions and claims of the moral swindlers, the political charlatans, the confidence tricksters and quacks, the confidence men, the religious frauds, the intellectual impostors, the social tricksters, the educational racketeers, the philosophical hoaxers, the ideological rogues, the judicial villains, and of course the groupies do-gooderism.

Here’s an example of Mencken’s style, from In Defense of Women, in which he mocked the folly of those superior pretensions held by men (a revolutionary concept at the time).

“A man’s women folk, whatever their outward show of respect for his merit and authority, always regard him secretly as an ass, and with something akin to pity. His most gaudy sayings and doing seldom deceive them; they see the actual man within, and know him for a shallow and pathetic fellow. In this fact, perhaps, lies one of the best proofs of feminine intelligence, or, as the common phrase makes it, feminine intuition. The mark of that so-called intuition is simply a sharp and accurate perception of reality, an habitual immunity to emotional enchantment, a relentless capacity for distinguishing clearly between the appearance and the substance. The appearance, in the normal family circle, is a hero, a magnifico, a demigod. The substance is a poor mountebank”

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Note: Speaking of souls did you also know that H. L. Mencken is a Saint in the Church of the Sub Genius? Well, it’s true.

Quoting Afghanistan’s Taliban

Mind-bogglingly astute observation: “The [NATO] soldiers have shaved their heads but when we see them washing they are still shampooing their heads, but they have no hair.”

Their charming and witty sense of humor: “Last year, after one attack near the town of Baramcha, there was the hand of one British soldier left on the field. We took it and we hung it as a souvenir in the room and sometimes we would shake the hand.”

Their silly harmless pranks: “We enjoy finding the [NATO] bombs unexploded. We have some guys with us, they are not Afghan, they use the bomb back on the British. I like to bury a gas canister on top of the bomb, the explosion is very large.”

Asking big and important questions: “When we go to a village at night the [NATO] soldiers come for us in helicopters. How can they see us? How do they know we are there? They have technology?”

On multiculturalism: “We have some other people with us, I can’t tell you where they are from but they don’t speak a language we understand.”

Taliban technology: “[We use] a bomb that recognizes the number [on a license] plate of a vehicle and only explodes with the number of the plate you put in a computer.”

Read article.

Taliban up ante in “battle of the sexes”

When this expression–battle of the sexes–is used in the West it usually has a comic connotation, popular in movies, for example, but in backward Islamic countries it is something that has dead serious meaning, as illustrated in the following story: “The most prominent female police officer in Afghanistan has been murdered by the Taliban, the latest victim in a vicious campaign against women in public life by Muslim fundamentalists. Malalai Kakar, who specialised in rescuing abused women, was shot dead outside her home in Kandahar…” Read this story.

Multiculturalism comes home to roost

What columnist Melanie Phillips says of the effect of multiculturalism in Britain could equally apply to the U.S.

“On the eve of the Tory Party conference, the shadow home secretary Dominic Grieve issued a blunt warning. In the name of multiculturalism, he said, Britain had done something terrible to itself. It had downplayed British cultural identity, leaving long-standing inhabitants fearful and new immigrants alienated, creating a vacuum ripe for exploitation by extremists. His warning could not be more timely or appropriate. Multiculturalism and its allied doctrines of human rights and anti-discrimination are acting as a kind of corrosive acid eating away at our institutions, values and national identity…This Labour Government which talks so much cant about Britishness has, in fact, hollowed it out with quite catastrophic consequences. Among the public, the rage and grief over this transformation of their country and the destruction of all they have held dear is exceeded only by their despair that no politician will have the courage to stem the tide of cultural collapse.” Read article here.

Radical Islamic cleric’s daughter goes extreme Western

It’s true, this young woman once wore a veil and struggled with the stifling constraints of Islam but no more. She has found her own independent life in England and has now reached the pinnacle of Western culture–pole dancing. As the daughter of Islamic firebrand hate belcher, cleric Omar Bakri Mohammed, “Yasmin Fostok might be expected to share his fanatical beliefs. But the radical Muslim’s daughter has ditched his extreme interpretation of Islam – as well as most of her clothing. The busty blonde has been revealed as a topless, tattooed pole dancer.” Well, it at least looks like Papa of hate won’t turn this girl into a terrorist anytime soon (in fact, I haven’t seen the statistics but I believe there are very few cases of pole dancers becoming suicide bombers). Read this story.

You might think this is a bad choice, since in the West where she now lives women have complete freedom and can become anything they want. Well, evidently this is what she wants. This is quite a contrast to Saudi Arabia, where women in that Muslim Gulf kingdom are legally obliged to cover up from head to toe in public, and cannot travel without written permission from a male guardian.

Update: You might be interested to know that the hateful cleric has divorced his first wife and has married  a girl younger than his daughter (I wonder if she ‘s a pole dancer too?).

The witch’s brew

Like me you’ve probably seen that video (or read about it) of Sarah Palin getting spiritual protection by some church preacher from witches. Now I admit, on the face of it that’s pretty strange. But believing in witches is not nearly as strange, not nearly as  bizarre as what Palin and Obama and McCain and Biden and Bush believe (or at lesat purport to believe). Namely this–they believe that some two thousand years ago a man (evidently not a warlock), born to a virgin mother, was removed from a Roman crucifixion cross and placed in a cave with a huge rock in front of it and then came back to life and rose up and revealed himself to his adoring followers and then rose into a place called Heaven. I don’t know about you, but somehow even a belief in witches makes a hell of a lot more sense than that bit of strange fantasy. But if they or anyone purports to be a real Christian, which I’ve heard these candidates say at various times, than that is exactly what you must believe (welcome to the supernatural club).

If you think the ongoing Chinese milk scandal is bad…

…Take a look at just a few past posts and references on the subject:

Chinese made Wall-mart sandals wreck woman’s feet

Poison Chinese pajamas (gee wiz, I sure hope these aren’t the Mickey Mouse ones I wear)

The Chinese toothpaste weapon

Chinese seafood imports raised in raw sewage

170,000 Chinese products could contain antifreeze

China exports lead poison in products

Avoiding Made-in-China products not easy

Cheap Chinese made tires blamed for fatalities

Chinese products burn, drown, drop and trap

Cadbury recalls Chinese chocolate bars

Etc, etc, etc…

Hey, here’s a couple of new ones: Chinese armchairs linked to eczema outbreak,  Gorillas suffering from Chinese milk. Europe bans Chinese baby food containing milk, Tainted Chinese milk products could affect 10, 000,000.

At last, walking made safe

One of the greatest safety inventions of the last three hundred years, it’s the airbag for walkers. A Japanese company, Prop, designed this air bag ostensibly for older walkers, but it can be used by anyone, even children and teens. As a typically bad translation of Japanese might put it, no longer you feel walking envy.

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Small print liability note: a word of caution before buying. Though this air system protects the back of the head and lower spine it does not offer facial protection. A severe fall on one’s face could, as it would without an airbag,  result in possible catastrophic damage, including severe and unsightly forehead edema, fractured cheek bones and loss of sight.

Surviving the downdraft

Down but not out… Remnant of free enterprise escapes the downdraft:

Live long and prosper (heh heh)

(Don’t worry, as more and more people lose their jobs pen cap competition will drive the price even further  down; look for five to six cents by mid- winter )

The Sublime Porte

We all know about the recent events concerning the the on-going death threats against Salmon Rushdie, the Danish cartoon riots, the murder of film maker Theo van Gogh, the  hounding of the “apostate” Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the withdrawal of publication of Sherry Jones book The Jewel of Medina, “a tale of lust, love and intrigue in the prophet’s harem” plus a host of other threats and demonstrations against criticsms (even when that criticism takes the from of reading actual hateful passages of the Koran itself) of Islam. I thought all of this was something that started with today’s radical muslims, where they aspire to trample the basic liberty of Western free speech. I had no idea this fascistic intolerance goes back hundreds of years. What’s especially interesting for here is Random House’s revoking the publication of  The Jewel of Medina. I’ve been reading The Portable Enlightenment Reader and came across an excerpt from Le Mariage De Figaro (1778) by Pierre De Beaumarchais, whose main character, describing a cynical progression of failings in his life, concludes with–”when I turned to a very different trade, and threw myself into the life of the theater. What a stone I hung around my neck that time! I sketched a comedy about harem life; being a Spanish writer [Catholic],  I assumed I could be irreverent towards Mohammed…but at once an Envoy from somewhere complained that my verses offended the Sublime Porte [The slamic court at Constantinople], Persia, a part of India, all Egypt, the kingdoms of Barca, Tripoli, Tunis, Algiers and Morocco; and there was my comedy burned, to please some Mohammedan princes not one of whom I suppose knows how to read, and who keeps curising away at us all as ‘Christian dogs’–not being able to degrade the human spirit, they take revenge by abusing it.” After several centuries it seems the Sublime Porte is still at it.

Even for the cynic, family life endures

What to do…Uncle B (short for Boon) offers the cynic a libation, but there is much to muse about before accepting. Is the cup clean? How do I know Uncle B hadn’t first taken a swig directly from the bottle (which he’s been known to do)? In that case there may well be many molecules of backwash in the cup (diluted as it might be–but still, the thought nauseates the cynic; Boon’s teeth are dark green and look like eyeless insects; and how does the cynic know he hadn’t urinated or spit in it at some time in the recent past, as he’s been known to do). But of course the cynic must accept the cup (Unlce B carries a hunting knife in his belt), so now the the problem becomes not whether to accept the cup or not but what to do once the cup is accepted. The cynic will do what the cynic must do: He will clandestinely pour the contents on the floor under the table and blame it on grandmother’s bladder problem.

P.S. Please do not worry about grandmother. She carries a long titanium darning needle under her bonnet. Uncle B will be lucky if he gets his knife even halfway out of his pants before his agonizing demise.

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Note: From bottom center L to R: Cynic Boon (yours truly), Little Sheba Boon, Father Boon, Virgin Mary Boon, Uncle Ignatius Boon, and the village whore (and only worker), Jezebel Boon. Source: the Boon Family chronicles

“Recalculating Newton’s endtimes clock”

The bad news: According to a new book, Temple at the Center of Time: Newton’s Bible Codex Deciphered and the Year 2012” by David Flynn, Sir Issac Newton’s endtimes estimation has been recalculated. It now predicts the end of the world by 2012. From the article about it: “In 2003, the Daily Telegraph in London published a front-page story declaring that, according to Isaac Newton, the world would end in 2060. This was the first time that this calculation of Newton became widely known. However, various biographers and researcher of Newton’s theology had encountered it since 1991 when most of his manuscripts were released on microfilm at the Jewish National and University Library in Jerusalem… 2013 follows the end of the great cycle of the Maya calendar and the planetary cycle of the Aztec calendar, which concludes Dec. 21, 2012. This date has raised apocalyptic fears in corners around the world. According to “The Bible Code,” the world will end on this date due to a collision with a meteor, asteroid, or comet. Another theory – the “Novelty Theory” – claims time itself is a “fractal wave,” which will end abruptly in 2012. Even the popular television program X-Files speculated that colonization of the earth by “aliens” would occur in December 2012…” Read story here.

Freedom Fest 2008 debates

Probably the two greatest and wittiest writers and debaters today–Dinesh D’Souza (What’s so Great about Christianity) and Christopher Hitchens (God is Not Great)–had a go at each other’s belief system at Freedom Fest ’08. The two have had many such debates together and you never come away without having learned something from both sides. Here, for example, is Part 5. These videos are available on Google vids and Youtube.

When is twittering in bad taste? It depends.

Yes, it’s a debatable subject. The crux of the stroy is based upon a tragic death:

“Rocky Mountain News reporter Berny Morson covered the Wednesday funeral of Marten Kudlis, who died last week when a pickup truck careered into a Baskin Robbins ice cream shop in Aurora, Colo. But instead of waiting until after the memorial service to publish a story, Morson sent real-time updates from his cell phone to the Rocky Mountain News’ Web site using a micro-blogging service called Twitter…” Read full stroy.

Here are some debatable entries– this view , for example, that it is appropriate (when not done for ghoulish reasons), and this view that it is a misguided media experiment.

Why would a reporter “twitter” such a story? From what I’ve read there was a point to be driven home, and he wanted to dramatise it with a description of the grief surrounding the boy’s family as it unfolded. The point being that the “driver who killed several people, including the young boy, was an illegal alien with a long arrest recrod who never even had a driver’s license. “Colorado is supposed to have some of the toughest immigration laws in the country. Yet an illegal immigrant managed to be arrested nearly 20 times over the past five years and remain free until he allegedly caused a car crash last week that killed two innocent women and a toddler…” Read full story.

I believe the point the reporter was driving home was this, that though of course the boy’s death would be horrible no matter who was responsible, the fact is that this particular case would not have come about if the law had be upheld and followed through at least one time during those 20 arrests.

The 72 virgins: a tragic religious soap opera in 72 lines

…ENTER LARGE-BREASTED VIRGINS [STAGE LEFT]–

1st virgin: OMG did you see my new matyred husband?
2nd virgin: OMG yes!
3rd virgin: What did he carry–extra explosives?
4th virgin: Oh, Jesus Christ, he looks awful.
5th virgin: Yeah, good luck in bed…
6th virgin: That really shits.
7th virgin: What the hell is al qaeda sending us!
8th virgin: There’s only so many of us, girls, we can end up with a hundred of those each.
9th virgin: Yeah, it could get to be a real dilemma or somethin’.
10th virgin: Oh, stop complaining, girls.
11th virgin Looks who’s talking, your martyred husband only lost two arms, his feet and a liver down there.
12th virgin: Yeah, stop complaining.
13th virgin: Hell, two arms and a liver and a couple of feet only?
14th virgin: Yeah, I’ve met him; his other parts are intact.
15th virgin: At least what’ve you’ve seen…(snicker, snicker…)
16th virgin: Mine lost his torso and some other parts.
17th virgin: You’re still lucky, mine has no head.
18th virgin: How do you kiss?
19th virgin: That’s the problem; we have to get very creative.
20th virgin: Poor dear, and you’re so pretty.
21st virgin: My martyred husband and I don’t kiss either.
22nd virgin: Yeah, I’ve seen him (yuk).
23rd virgin: Can’t they use smaller backpacks and bombs?
24th virgin: No, they gotta use regulation size.
25th virgin: Damn it!
26th virgin: I don’t have a martyred husband yet.
27th virgin: You don’t?
28th virgin: No, she’s always alone. Can’t you see that?
29th virgin: Don’t tease her, girls, it’s not her fault.
30th virgin: Yeah, no teasing.
31st virgin: Well, dear, maybe you’ll get lucky.
32nd virgin: She will.
33rd virgin: Yeah, haven’t we all (heh heh).
34th virgin: Yeah, right (heh heh).
35th virgin: Oh, I hope our prospects get better.
36th virgin: What about those female martyrs we’re hearing so much about.
37th virgin: Why, don’t tell me you’d consider going lesbo…
38th virgin: Of course she wouldn’t…
39th virgin:Yeah, what happens to them anyway?
40th virgin: I heard they go to a different paradise.
41st virgin: This is the only one, deary. It’s here or nowheresville.
42nd virgin. Duh…
43rd virgin: Whatever.
44th virgin: Well, I bet they’re a real mess too.
45th virgin: Yeah.
46th virgin: Poor dears.
47th virgin: Well, you know what they say: You play with fire, you get burned by fire.
48th virgin: Who says that?
49th virgin: The Christians or somebody.
50th virgin: Jesus, I hate Christians.
51st virgin: Yeah, me too.
52nd virgin: Yeah, and get a load of that Pope guy.
53rd virgin: What’s that contraption he rides in?
54th virgin: Pope mobile.
55th virgin: Pope mobile?
56th virgin: Yeah.
57th virgin: Does it have a combustion engine?
58th virgin: Naw, I think he pushes it with his feet…
59th virgin: Yeah, like one of them Flintstone cars.
60th virgin: Exactly…great cartoon by the way.
61st virgin: Yeah, I have the complete DVD set. I love their pet Dino.
62nd virgin: Oh, don’t let You-Know-Who see it. Willma and Betty don’t wear much.
63rd virgin: Don’t worry, I have them hidden under my burka.
64th virgin: Cool.
65th virgin: You know what DVD set I wanna get? Desperate Housewives.
66th virgin: Which.
67th virgin: Desperate Housewives?
68th virgin: Yeah, I’ve seen it. It’s about these upper middle class American Christian wives.
69th virgin: I heard of that; it’s about them and their evil Christian husbands.
70th virgin: You know what, girls?
71st virgin: What?
72nd virgin: We out to make our own show…We can call it Desperate Virgins.

–EXIT LARGE-BREASTED VIRGINS [STAGE RIGHT]

The Creepy Plotters

Conservative/free thinker Englishman Peter Hitchens (brother of former Englishman Christopher Hitchens) is on a tirade against the “creepy plotters“, (which of course, as everyone should know, refers to those oppressive squiggly Stalinist vermian crawlers manning the governement stations).  Also, I might add, these creepy plotters, of which we have plenty here in the USA as well, are dedicated to their brand of culture management, who at any opportunity hope to dissuade us, through laws favoring secret agendas and PC bullying, from exercising our liberty. You see, if we are the apple, the creepy plotters are the Stalinist worms.

Well, agree or not, here’s an excerpt from Hitchens’s latest column.: It’s the creepy plooters who should really scare us. There is no such organisation as ‘Al Qaeda’. The spooks know this, Cabinet Ministers know this and so do the ‘security correspondents’ who so readily trot out the spooks’ point of view on our broadcasting networks. Of course, there are terrorists, and there are also fantasists, fanatics, low-lifes and camp followers who plot and attempt horrible things. Some of them even call themselves ‘Al Qaeda’ these days because they have learned that this is a good way to scare us. But, while they are a menace, they are not as big or as organised a menace as the Government likes to make out. The State and the vainglorious bureaucrats of the ‘security’ services need to pretend that the terrorists are a tightly organised and terrifying threat, to make themselves look big as well – and to help them get hold of new powers to snoop on us and push us around.

Those damn  Stalinist worms!

“The Patronizing factor”

In my humble opinion Englishman turned American, scotch drinker, part time socialist and god debunker (among other things) Christopher Hitchens certainly qualifies as the new H. L. Mencken. Along with his books (God is Not Great, The Missionary Position, A Long Short War) you may want to read his columns at Slate. The excerpt from below concerns the partonizing of Sarah Palin. The reference to the “most dysfunctional family” stems from what Hitchens wrote about the Clintons in No One Left to Lie: The Values of the Worst Family.

I could well be wrong, but I think something similar is involved in the attempt to paint the Palin family as if it were Arkansas on ice or Tobacco Road with igloos and Inuit. Very well, she possibly has had her Troopergate and even trailer-park moments. But whom exactly did the Democrats drown in moist applause, for two nights running, in Denver? The most dysfunctional family ever to occupy not the vice-presidential mansion but the executive one. It’s hard to imagine that there will be any more unwanted pregnancies or shotgun weddings when or if the Palins move to the Naval Observatory on Massachusetts Avenue, whereas with the Clintons, the very thing that made all Bill’s friends turn white and pee green was that they made him the president, and he still wouldn’t stop. For me, it is astonishing that the Democrats have been babbling all week as if this point isn’t just waiting—indeed begging—to be made in riposte to their “opposition research.”

The ubiquitous brothel scene in London

“When Frank rang a brothel in Enfield, he could hear a baby crying in the background. When Alan called one in Southwark, he could make out the sound of a child asking for his tea. And when Mick called another to inquire about their services, he was told that he could have a “dirty Oriental bitch who will do stag nights, anal, and the rest.” The men were undertaking research for Big Brothel: a Survey of the Off-Street Sex Industry in London, the most comprehensive study ever conducted into brothels in the UK. The project, which gathered information from 921 brothels in the capital, was commissioned by the Poppy Project, the only British organisation that offers support for women trafficked into prostitution…” Rest of article

Ike, wind, and water

Weather service smells ratings, optimizes its Ike storm prognostication with”Certain Death,” maximizes language redundancy with “massive 20 ft surge” (yes, massive is a redundancy of the figure 20). Worse strom to hit Texas since Halley’s Comet was first sighted. Yes yes the total energy of a hurricane equals many atomic bombs and throw some explosive  hydrogen particle equations in there too. Don’t look around the cornor because massive killer death will hit you between the eyes. Politicise it: Obama team says strom is direct result of McCain policies; McCain blames it on Ted Kennedy’s brain tumor. Creationists blame it on CERN’s atom-smasher. Play some religion hardball–jack it in there like a fast ball slider: Pat Robertson says approaching massive death storm is from masturbation among unmarried Texans.

The sexual allure of drab totalitarian women

Ah, yes, the sexual allure of drab totalitarian women…I love totalitarian women. I mean let’s face it, is there anything sexier than goose-stepping militant North Korean commie babes in short OD uniform skirts armed with AK-47s? Right, I didn’t think so. Check out the 60th anniversary parade.

North Korean Babe Brigade

More North Korean babes (Kim ll-sung sure has it made in the shade)*

(OK, I know the boots are made from the hides of political prisoners, but they still look pretty hot on the girls.)

Another shot of the North Korean babes in arms (and there’s something very suggestive about the placement of those swords)

And let’s not forget these totalitarian North Korean Navy recruits

N. Korean totalitarian navy babes up close and personal.

More incredible totalitarian women (of the OMG variety) on parade, this time in Russia  (yes, Russia is still totalitarian, well at least authoritarian).

Totalitarian Russian female soldiers up close (Look at the leering sausage eaters in the background).

Totalitarian ladies, listen, if we ever meet on opposite sides in combat I will let you shoot me as long as you rest my bleeding head on your lap as I gaze into your luscious blue eyes. OK? Huh? Hello?…

Even more hot totalitiarian women (Chinese militia)

Believe it or not–even MORE hot totalitarian women

Oh please pretty please please give us more (God bless totalitarian women in uniform)

Even under that totalitarian Islamic burka I can tell she’s hot.

Hmmmmm….which one tonight (you lucky dictator you)?

Kim’s narrowing it down–and the “winner” is…

Presidential experience–think nothing of it. It’s bogus.

A lot of people have been saying Sarah Palin has no experience to be President; others say the same about Obama. But here’s the deal. Experience doesn’t matter. A twelve year old kid who’s still in the first grade could become president and lead the country. He’d have advisors and surrogates, he’d have administrators and an experienced person, replete with his people, in every slice of the governement pie. Experienced cogs and coggers would be head military department, the economic department, etc, etc; another experienced person would hold the keys to the bunker under the White House. An experienced chef would make the food, experienced secret service guys would still be in their trenchcoats and Bausch & Lomb aviators. The little kid president could sit up in the oval office all day with his milk and cookies watching Sponge Bob Square Pants and writing on the walls with crayons and the country wouldn’t have the slightest problem functioning (at least no more than usual). The existing momentum of the government would rumble on, just like the universe, day and night after day and night. What do you think was running the country as Bill was spending hours ejaculating onto various White House carpets? Momentum. What do you think is running the country while Bush is chopping away at seven or eight cords of wood for the cameras on his fake ranch? Momentum. Speaking of Bush. If Bush fell asleep right now (let’s all hope) and didn’t wake up till the new President walked  in through the front door you would never have noticed the difference. Everything would still be working. NORAD would still be on alert, all emergency exits would still be open. So don’t worry about experience in a president or his Vice. As Penn & Teller might say, experience is bullshit.

The rivals of Jesus

Back in the days before Global Warming and iPhones there was no dearth of would-be Messiahs, of which Jesus was just one (e.g. see Apollonius of Tyana). Jesus, however,  got lucky somewhere along the line. Maybe that slickly publicised Lazurus trick really clinched it for him–oh, and let’s not forget Emperor Constantine. From National Geographic’s Secret Bible (video excerpt (by the way, this link is for the long version).

CAUTIONARY NOTE: Before watching this please keep in mind that the Spanish Inquisition comedy team of Pat Robertson and Benny Hinn have placed a curse upon it. Anyone who views it will go blinder than Stevie Wonder and will die a horrible death from syphllis, with festering sores spreading over their enire body (not that you’ll be able to see them).

CAUTIONARY NOTE 2: You may want to watch at least Part 1 of the movie Zeitgeist, available here, which clearly and verifiably documents the mostly Egyptian and Roman myths that Christianity is based upon. Unfortunately Part 2 is extremely controversial, exploring “conspiracies” of  9/11, -but don’t let that throw you off from the first part. Part 3 is about the Federal reserve bank, one-world governement and war.

When is listening not reading?

Here is the great question of the age. When is listening not reading? That is, if I listen to, say Benjamin Franklin: An American Life, is that considered in the same league as having read it? Here it is on my iPod. Is that unabridged file the equivalent of a book on a shelf?

I’ve listened to this entire book. But that feeling of “not really having got into it” is gnawing at the back of my mind. It’s like I don’t really own it. I can just imagine someone looking at my bookshelf and thinking, Oh, he doesn’t have Ben Franklin: An American Life. He ought to read that sometime.

Cyber Sutra–Meet India’s Savita Bhabhi

Cyber Sutra: India’s online eroticism: India’s “first online pornographic comic book strip is luring tens of thousands of internet viewers, who are logging on for a daily dose of stimulation and humour courtesy of the buxom Savita Bhabhi…”Who is she? “Savita Bhabhi is a busty and artfully drawn Indian housewife who loves her husband, Ashok Patel, but gets bored during the long days she spends alone at home while he is busy at the office. The full colour cartoons detail her fun-filled adventures with everyone from the door-to-door lingerie salesman (“Can you help me please… The hook is stuck.”) to two energetic young men who lose their cricket ball in her garden and a hunky cousin visiting from the US. In every episode, Savita’s bountiful charms and washboard-flat abdomen ensure she always snares her target…” Well greetins from New Jersey USA, Savita Bhabhi–May god grant you eternal life and prosperity even though you’re only a cartoon.

Obligatory sin and damnation warning: This link directs you to this erotic cartoon series. Obligatory sin and damnation warning 2:  This post in no way is meant to demean Indian barebreasted cartoon women. Women of all races, creeds and ethnic groups can be barebreasted cartoon characters. FMC does not and will not condone any kind of barebreasted female cartoon sterotyping. If you are looking for barebreasted female cartoon sterotyping please go elsewhere.

A boatload of other candidates, but only a handful of rowers

The way the news has it the only parties running are the Democrats and Republicans. Once in awhile a third party is mentioned (like when Perot ran). But there’s actually a lot of parties out there–there’s the Boston Tea Party, Personal Choice Party, Constitution Party, Green Party, Libertarian Party, New American Independent Party, Party for Socialism and Liberation, Prohibition Party (the Proabition Party?), Reform Party, Socialist Party USA, Socialist Workers Party, along with various Independents who don’t have a party.

Of course the numbers for these other parties aren’t great, even with Alan Keyes in the running, and so don’t make for worthwhile convention coverage as far as TV economics is concerned. Take The Contitution Party National Convention vote:

Total equals 516 votes for its Prez candidate? That doesn’t even add up to the number of advisors McCain and Obama each have.

One thing that’s a lot more interesting about these smaller parties and their conventions, at least the one above, is that there’s probably a more vigorous democratic vote battle going on (except, I’m sure, for the likes of Socialist Workers Party, etc.) during the convention process itself. McCain/Palin and Obama/Biden were already the ticket for their respective parties before the convention even got started. The press drama about super delecates and whether or not, for example, Hillary would release them was clearly a false drama. It was all preprocessed like a plastic mold.

20 women to reckon with (including our own Hillary and Sarah)

The London Times lists the 20 most controversial women in history. Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin are among them. Well I’ve met these women in history reading and have my own take on them, so here we go–a short rundown: 1 Messalina (licentious wife of stuttering Emperor Claudius, early first century), 2 Boudicca (female warrior, sort of like Xena but not so much leather and no Gabrielle sidekick-mid first century), 3 Joan of Arc (hot religious fanatic, she killed for god, country and insanity–seemed to relish being burned at the stake: “Hold the cross high so I may see it through the flames!”), 4 Lucrezia Borgia (a girl with a bad reputation, like Lohan after her, attended decadent parties–and to think her father was a Pope; no wonder Buffalo Bill named his shootin’ rifle after her), 5 Elizabeth (queen who used only her first name, like Madonna or Cher), 6 Mary (known as Bloody Mary to her friends–I mean enemies–another queen with first name ego), 7 Marie Antoninette (the Spears-Lohan of her generation–eighteenth century, let them eat cake–finally beheaded by creepy pre-Marxist sadists), 8 Catherine the Great (great in bed that is, had her maids first test potential lovers, then report back with the details), 9 Queen Ranavalona (nicknamed the Bloody Mary of Madagascar–one sick bimbo, “had Christians trussed up like chickens and repeatedly thrown off cliffs or placed in pits which slowly filled with boiling water ” –real nice lady–and I use the word “lady” very loosely), 10 Tsaritsa Alexandra (hung out with that wild bearded Rasputin–enough said), 11 Jiang Qing (the blushing gang-of-four cultural revolutionary wife of brutal mass killer and Humpty-Dumpty lookalike Chairman Mao–yeas later she had the decency to hang herself in a bathroom), 12 Indira Gandhi (great personal style, also authortarian excess, thought to be  a nasty political cheater like all other politicians in the world), 13 Eva Peron (Argentine politician called Evita,  played by Madonna in movie, and now entered into cult status), 14 Maggie Thatcher (a woman hated by the left, once invaded a windswept nearly deserted useless island to show that Britain was still mighty, and now like all politicians in or out of office suffering from bouts of dementia–often compared to Ronald Reagan but without the Brylcream), 15 Winnie Mandela (brutal wife of terrorist Nelson), 16 Benazir Bhutto (lovely Pakistani politician who covered her luxuriously flowing gorgeous dark hair with a damned headscarf), 17 Imelda Marcos (leading figure of the shoe power movement in the Philippines), 18 Carla Bruni (French president Sarkozy’s wife…her conquests include Mick Jagger and Eric Clapton, among many others of course–not that there’s anything wrong with that). Finally we get to the crux of the list: 19 Hillary Clinton (refused to kick Bill out after he had affair with that other woman, the one he didn’t have sex with because it really wasn’t sex–now there was her chance to be president), and finally 20 Sarah Palin (self-described pitbull with lipstick, beautiful bespectacled Alaskan mother, governor and VP candidate–hunts and kills her own mooseburgers).

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NOTE: If controversy is the keyword than this list neglects many names. Among the ancients what about Cleopatra? What about Florence Nightingale, who uprooted the entire Brit army medical establishment? Then there’s Charlotte Corday, who dutifully murdered French revolutionary and advocate of the Reign of Terror, Jean-Paul Marat as he steeped in his bath and then bravely went to the guillotine for it. It’s been observed that she had been so calm and collected before dying that she even asked about the deadly contraption’s construction. “I have killed one man to save a hundred thousand,” she said (hey, I really like this woman). And what of Victoria Woodhull, who ran for President of the United States in 1872? Her platform? Free love. I also can’t understand why Palin and Clinton are on the list of “controversial” women. What’s controversial about them exactly–that one wears pants suits and the other hunts and fishes? …Oh, yeah, and what about Pope Joan?

One more example. Controversy cuts three ways–the good, the bad, and the ugly. Here’s another woman not on the list above who was certainly controversial: Marie Stopes , described as a feminist”…best remembered for opening the first family planning clinic in Britain in 1921. But she is also a controversial figure who was accused of being racist and anti-Semitic and advocated eugenics – even disapproving of her own son’s choice of wife because she was short-sighted and wore glasses. She also once sent a loving letter and book of her poems to Adolf Hitler…” Curiously, she held very similar views to American Susan B. Anthony as far a eugenics were concerned.

The headless state of Mexico

“There’s a peaceful aura about the lifeless faces lined up on the video, death having drained the tension from their cheeks, their eyes wide shut above thick moustaches and square jaws. But as the shot pans out, the horror of their end is revealed: The dead men’s heads have been roughly hacked away from their torsos, which the camera finds hanging upside down across the room on meat hooks, their blood draining away onto white floor tiles…Decapitations have become as commonplace in the increasingly vicious narco turf battles as stabbings are in London. During August alone, gangsters hacked off 30 craniums across the country — adding to the total of almost 200 beheadings in 2008 so far. Heads have been stuck on crosses, shoved into iceboxes and left in car trunks along with snakes… ” Continue reading Time article.

When grief rises to the–branches

I love trees too but, er… well, this is ridiculous.

This is the Earth First group; Though they’re radical enviornmentalists–anti capitalists, etc– I haven’t read where they’re into violent confrontations or arson or spiking (though I’m not entirely sure) as are some other such groups. I mean what they’re doing here, though silly, is more in line with New Age reclamation religious acculturation (huh?).

Here’s some related material: The last tree sitter comes down.

Does the very short ghost of the very short Kim Jong-il walk among us?

Is nothing real anymore? To be more specific,  is Kim Jong-il, the Dear Leader of North Korea for real? And at the risk of being a punster, has he been more “il” than we thought? “The question has baffled foreign intelligence agencies for years but now a veteran Japanese expert (and who’s to argue with Japanese experts) on North Korea says the “dear leader” is actually dead – and his role is played by a double…The expert says Kim died of diabetes in 2003 and world leaders including Vladimir Putin of Russia and Hu Jintao of China have been negotiating with an impostor. ” Continue reading story here.

Now here’s an interesting update (hmmmmm): Kim absent from big anniversary parade

Uh-oh, looks like we’re getting closer to point.

The reverential death efficiency syndrome

Nancy Pelosi , as a representative of the United States, has just visited Hirosama to put flowers on the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.

I understand about 140,000 people were killed instantly from the atomic bomb blast on Hiroshima.  Another 80,000 were killed a few days later in Nagasaki. What is curious is why the atomic bomb deaths have taken on almost spititual overtones in the memorial zeitgeist. Is it because so many died in so short a time (a split second really)? If the time element is the reason what about the Dresden fire bombing? There thousands of tons of incendinary explosives were used that, as the name implies, caused a firestorn (some likened it to a typhoon of fire, killing–and here there is controversy about the actual number–anywhere from perhaps 40,000 or 50,000 to a quarter million. This also happened in a relatively short period of time (but certrainly longer than a split second). History.com describes it this way:

More than 3,400 tons of explosives were dropped on the city by 800 American and British aircraft. The firestorm created by the two days of bombing set the city burning for many more days, littering the streets with charred corpses, including many children. Eight square miles of the city was ruined, and the total body count was between 35,000 and 135,000 (an approximation is all that was possible given that the city was filled with many refugees from farther east). The hospitals that were left standing could not handle the numbers of injured and burned, and mass burials became necessary.

The way they died–by immense heat and  flame-blasting winds– must have been very similar to the way they died in Japan (many also were killed and later died from Dresden type firestorms in other Japanese cities). The point is Pelosi, as far as I know, has never laid wreaths in Dresden (or those other firestorm cities) so what is the moral difference between deaths caused by atomic blast and those by non-atomic-firestorm other than the span of time? Is Pelosi laying a memoral wreath to an extemely short span of time? That is, is she memoralizing only those deaths that took seconds, and ignoring those that took somewhat longer? Therein lies the mystique of the Atomic Bomb, able to do in a mere second what otherwise would take hours or days. It represents the hallowed respect we have for the science of efficient mass extermination.