Saintperle

4/25/09

Let's see, here's Tom Hanks...

... a brilliant actor with a brilliant mastery of his craft which he uses to specialize in mediocre vehicles that will gross huge amounts, enabling him to get up there on the throne to be linked with Steven Spielberg, yet another brilliant master of technical production values who ALSO limits his masterful craft to ideas that are mediocre enough to warrant HUGE grosses...

Two people whose talents are prodigious -- as long as they're in the warm and human, tell us what we already know but want to hear told to us in a different story.

So now it's Angels and Demons filming the SECOND blockbuster (after The Da Vinci Code) by Dan Brown, a super-best-selling author whose writing is so appalling as to instill wonder in readers who have read actual literature (to say nothing of those who had read his surprise-ending plots several decades ago in Baigent and Lee's books -- Holy Blood, Holy Grail, etc)

BUT -- in the words of Eleanor Roosevelt, "Nonetheless..." the point I'd like to make is that the TV ads for the new movie talks about the secret society whose members were cruelly massacred by the Holy Roman Church centuries ago and now "they're back for revenge."

And each time we see him mouth those words, I think: "Yeah, so don't they deserve it? Cruelly massacred? Maybe the Church has it coming as the Pope's chickens come home to roost."

We're raised on movies about comebacks after being cruelly defeated -- Pearl harbor, Rocky, et al -- so it seems to me that "The Revenge of the Illuminati" should be popular a topic as "The Revenge of the Jedi" (renamed before release as "The Return of the Jedi" since Mr Lucas -- no slacker at mediocrity himself -- realized that Jedi would never seek revenge. Not part of their code.) Perhaps calling this "The Return of the Illuminati" might make it clear why so many people will be cheering for the Illuminati to throw down on the Vatican.

But then, where money is concerned, as William Blake put it centuries before moving pictures were invented: "Where there is a view to money, art can not exist but war only."

And motion pictures are an industry where, as John Osborne observed: "People who have a facility for making money seem to think that qualifies them to make creative decisions."

SO, we're all out here saying (even though we know the substandard script won't go that way:)

GO ILLUMINATI, GO!
Bishops, Cardinals, Priests and Popes --
look over your shoulders cuz payback time is here.



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4/23/09

The Good that Dick Cheney Does

Well, it's a reach, but he seems to be -- in one way -- having a positive effect on health in the USA, combating obesity with what I like to call The Bulemic Effect --

Every time people see his sneering mask on TV, they feel like throwing up.

And whether it's the taste of vomit in the throat or actual chunder, it all goes to getting that weight down.

Other than that, he's not doing anything but committing sedition, and spewing hate and venom and slime (all of which affect the appetite.)

Still his effect on improving public health is just as notable as, say, Hitler's effect on making public anti-semitism as strict taboo for many years (aside from developing the Volkswagen).

So thanks for helping me -- along with millions of others, Dick, to shed those extra pounds that crept up on us during HBO specials -- just thinking about you makes me decide to skip lunch.

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4/22/09

BUT ...

The Bush-leaguer's defense of their torture is the principle we, in the USA, have despised almost forever --- the ONLY thing they're saying ("Oh we prevented attacks on this and that and...")

All they're saying is:


"SEE? THE END JUSTIFIES THE MEANS?"


Combine that with "If you were only following orders, then well, ok..."

I saw some asshole from the Hoover Institute on Washington Journal this morning and he was talking that way, running down a list of the attacks the DIDN'T happen because we were waterboarding and besides, our military people all get waterboarded in training, so how bad could it be?

And all I could think of was: "Have YOU ever been waterboarded? No? Then you don't know what the hell you're talking about."

I may be biased -- I often wonder why any news people ask ANYONE from the Hoover Institute for their opinions -- once we know the topic and that the person will be from Hoover, we can tell in advance what the answer will be. (But they're smart enough so GENERALLY they don't parrot the party line word for word, but do a bit of rewrite and editing.)

They sit there in their ivory tower on the Stanford Campus, waiting for Prince Charming to show up, and THEY'RE part of that group that mocks ivory tower academics.

But -- tangent aside -- we're looking at the sum total of the intelligensia of Political Conservatism, and the best they can do to justify the monstrous pain and terror OUR PEOPLE inflict on people they THINK MIGHT BE involved in terroism is tell us in dozens of different ways that:

THE ENDS JUSTIFY THE MEANS


That's where we are now?
Only following orders and the ends justify the means?
Pathetic.

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4/21/09

So Cheney thinks it's ok to commit war crimes, IF

... IF the end in any way justified the means.

Sure we tortured, you sez, but so what?
We got those guys to say what we wanted them to.

And of course, with a total lack of historical knowledge, you REALLY (?) think that Obama making some sort of acknowledgment with regret to the historical facts of our support of mass murderers to run countries (Trujillo, Somoza, Marcos, et al) is a terrible thing.

That Obama smiling like a diplomat is a crime, but your instigation and supervision of the slaughter and maiming of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis as a way of getting more and more and more money for your pals at Halliburton ISN'T? Even to the point of stealing it from funds intended to serve and protect our military people.

I guess the idea of having to sit down, shut up, and live with what you've done -- that terrifies you.

As maybe it should.

Because what we had for 8 years is a, administration which was no more than a bunch of pugnacious babies insisting they're TOUGH GUYS while hiding their heads under the covers, leaving a nightlight on, and yelling at the monsters in the closet "YOU BETTER NOT COME IN HERE!!!"

The more you talk the more we see increasingly how despicable you are -- even me, and when you were in office, I pretty much thought you were an obscene waste of protoplasm.

So, little Dickie -- why don't you just shut the fuck up -- NO ONE wants to hear you whining.

You had 8 years to approximate human form and destroy and kill and maim and steal without any interference, just a smiling sock monkey for a president -- and you did PLENTY of that.

Every word you say in public now just shows more slime, more venom, more rot and stink and corruption.

So for your own self as well as ours --- shut the fuck up. Because the only possible positive function you're having now is to control the amount of obesity in America by causing a bulemic reaction in everyone who is within range of your amazingly smarmy slimy voice -- when you open your mouth, we all taste the vomit rising.

I pity you -- you committed so many atrocities and crimes, you are in mortal terror of the music ever stopping and you having to answer that Beatles question: "What do you see when you turn out the light?"

If I had a dog in as much pain as you are showing -- I'd ask the vet to put him down.

But in your case -- I sincerely hope you have the long long hideously tortured life you created for yourself.

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The Pulitzer Prize-winning story you won't see on TV

From Glen Greenwald's 9/ 21/09 column in Salon.com:

The description by the Pulitzer Committee of the award presented for investigative journalism:

Awarded to David Barstow of The New York Times for his tenacious reporting that revealed how some retired generals, working as radio and television analysts, had been co-opted by the Pentagon to make its case for the war in Iraq, and how many of them also had undisclosed ties to companies that benefited from policies they defended.

You can read the Pulitzer Committee's award statement here which ALSO provides links to the New York Times articles that were the reason for the award.

Greenwald's excellent commentary provides updates and in-depth information about the disappearance of the Pulitzer story from all the TV networks that offer what they call "news" (and that includes those oriented right, left and sideways):

...By whom were these "ties to companies" undisclosed and for whom did these deeply conflicted retired generals pose as "analysts"? ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN and Fox -- the very companies that have simply suppressed the story from their viewers....

Oh -- We've all seen General Barry McCaffrey pontificating -- you know, McCaffrey, who supervised the same government media manipulation as Drug Czar from 1996 to 2001 -- according to the prize-winning series as well as the congressional investigation, he was the worst of the lot.

You can check it out in McCaffrey's Wikipedia entry.

That entry also mentions allegations of McCaffrey's involvement with war crimes during the Iraq war, but he denies it (oh what a surprise) and he also got Saint Colin the Truth-Teller to support him -- you know, GENERAL Colin Powell who held up a vial of talcum powder at the UN and called it anthrax, and who -- as MAJOR Powell, was assigned to investigate allegations of a Charlie Company massacre of civilians at My Lai, investigated and -- MIRABLE DICTU!! -- found no basis to the accusation of the crimes, delaying exposure of the My Lai Massacre for nearly a year. Surely no one can doubt HIS word.

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4/12/09

FINALLY -- some people are noticing the obvious:

That if we do the following things:

1) Stop insisting that marijuana is an evil criminal plant obviously the creation of the devil -- and

2) Stop spending billions of dollars a year arresting and imprisoning people who grow it and/or use it -- and

3) Stop spending other billions trying to destroy the dope fields of California, the product of which generates billions of dollars of income -- and

4) Allow the sale of USA-grown marijuana to be legal and generating tax revenues...

then

1) We will be getting a lot closer to balancing our budgets -- and

2) We won't be financing the Mexican drug cartels

SO:

In other words, kids -- as they say in the mystery stories cui bono? (who benefits?) --- follow the money and it becomes obvious who's REALLY financing the Mexican Drug Cartels:

1) The DEA

2) The American Weapons Industry

3) The American Prison Industry -- guards, construction, caterers, et al

4) The various policing forces on local, county, state, and federal levels.

And the answer is --- what a surprise!

It's our various governmental crooks once again running an incredibly profitable phony war they really do NOT want to win, because they're getting so rich from it.

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But wait! Is this a sense of humor I see before me, smiles turned toward my mind?

Anyone who reads this blog more or less occasionally, even frequently, might know that I have often worried about what happened to my sense of humor
("I'm sure I had one with me when I came in, but I seem to have misplaced it. Lost it? Don't know...")
I even find, at times, I can't even recognize it when OTHERS have it and show it. Certainly I THINK (I could be wrong) that it seems to have disappeared from the entire society.

I DO think the idea that someone's man-woman marriage is under siege when two men or two women want to validate their love and commitment with a man-man or woman-woman marriage to each other is totally bizarre and hysterically funny.

But then I think it's sort of mean-spirited of me to laugh at those people whose relationship with reality is so fragile that they live in hideous terror.

So I'm happy if someone can make the same point with a gentle and benign tickle.

Thank you Philip Baruth --- From Vermont Daily Briefing:

April 8th, 2009

BREAKING NEWS: GAY MARRIAGE PASSES; HETEROSEXUAL MARRIAGES TOTTERING; POLYGAMY AND INCEST BILLS MOVING QUICKLY THROUGH HOUSE AND SENATE; AND VDB’S OWN MARRIAGE COMES A CROPPER. REALLY.

By Philip Baruth (his bio)

Sure, same-sex marriage became the law of the land in Vermont yesterday, and that was a huge blow for civil rights, and against the sort of timid, defensive politics Jim Douglas practiced all through the Bush years. And yes, that will add weight to the decisions taken recently in Iowa and Sweden and D.C. and all of that together may produce a tipping point on the issue nationally, even globally. All to the good.

But what about the crippling and immediate consequences for VDB’s own heterosexual marriage? It is to weep, friends.

As much as we hate to admit it, Rick Santorum and Mark Shepard were right all along, and so precisely right as to be frightening: by 9 pm last night, VDB’s heterosexual marriage was in tatters, and we’d moved in with a male Boxer/Chow mix we met at the dog park last spring.


And of course, because same-sex marriage destroyed our respect for the very principle of monogamy itself, the Boxer, whose name is Sugar Ray, is now pushing us to include other dogs in our impending marriage, a poodle from Milton and a Sharpei from the Old North End with whom he has a pre-existing relationship.

Which means that by this time next year, we’ll be raising 30 or 40 puppies, and since we can’t afford nearly that many — you got it — we’ll be first in line at the Welfare office down on Pearl Street.

So we’d like to take this moment to publicly apologize to both Santorum and Shepard. You saw the slope; you knew it to be slippery — wicked slippery. But we wouldn’t listen. We were so locked into our little ironic blogs, our lattes and evolution, our blind ideological push for equality.

But you two knew all along. And we didn’t listen.

And so now, belatedly, we’ll do what we can to honor your foresight, your warnings that went unheeded: we will name every scrawny cross-bred puppy we ever have after one or the other of you. Either Rick or Mark, Santorum or Shepard. Those are the only names we’ll use, except for variations on the theme: Marky, Shep, Little Ricky, Latin for Asshole, etc. You have our word.

And one day every single mutt in this town will be named for the last two major defenders of the Old Way, which will only be right and fitting.

Then, and only then, will Vermont be for Lovers again.

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More about same-sex marriage on this same page

(Warning -- contains sense of humor about this subject)





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4/8/09

Forget Steve McQueen, Clint Eastwood, George Clooney -- a new definition of "cool."

This morning, in the medieval town of L'Aquila, workers rescued a 98-year-old woman who'd been buried under earthquake rubble for 30+ hours.

She was fine.

They asked her how she had kept it together and she said:

"I passed the time crocheting."

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"Every normal man must be tempted,
at times, to spit on his hands,
hoist the black flag,
and begin slitting throats."


H.L. Mencken

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Do they even think AT ALL in Sacramento? BUMPING up the sales tax? Sometimes saying "ENOUGH" can be very very ugly -- necessary, but ugly.

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That iron-pumping giant self-loving asshole from Austria and the jock-sniffing house of reps full of people fighting each other for position to be first in line to push their noses as far up his ass as they can get -- they seem to think as long as they get theirs and their contributors (i.e., those who are consistent with their bribes) get the rest, everything will be fine.

So the only people whose wrath they don't mind are the general public who -- they figure (probably correctly as we've seen) -- were stupid enough to believe their tarnished promises before so why not now?

Have any of them noticed that there is a problem that involved people NOT BUYING STUFF?

Have any of them considered what bumping the state sales tax up to add just under 10% to the price of the goods (when added to city and county taxes) will do to the economy?

(When someone used the word "economy" -- he or she is showing a mental construct of a person who does NOT think in terms of "people." As long as the stock market is hot and high, the CEO's of various companies certainly don't give a flying fuck about how many people have lost their jobs and homes and health in order to let them show their stockholders a positive balance sheet?)

Add that to the local counties who are adding their own 1/2% to push the sales tax OVER 10%.

Try selling a new car with that extra taste counted in.


They just don't give a flying fuck about anything but "I got mine Jack, fuck you."

Oh, that and they also worry a bit about the people they like to think are insane who want to shoot them.

(Of all the stupid and insane incidents of violence in our society, the idea of shooting the people who lie to us to let them run the machinery of government and then steal from us until hell won't have it -- that's the only governmental reform idea that comes close to being sane and reasoned.)


Hey -- the Pacific Stock Exchange building on California Street in San Francisco is open to the public -- even the gun-toting public... and those guns sales really help "the eekonomy." How long before someone stroking his gun-barrel thinks that one through?

Even though -- probably -- even a massacre of the trading-floor speculators might not make those people actually think about why people hate them so much, but even if it doesn't, it would certainly be satisfying for the rest of us to watch the video played over and over and over again on the TV news.

Yeah, I know some of those people are really nice guys.

Too bad.

They played the same game and took the same money -- they get to pay the same dues as the mean soul-less vicious motherfuckers .

The law doesn't distinguish between nasty unpleasant drug dealers and nice congenial drug dealers who are just supplying the family with a little smoke. So why should anyone who is looking at the people who play games with our financial viability for their own profit?

It would probably be nicer if the shooters started with the media freaks who are stirring hatred and pointing political fingers at the ones they call traitors. You know who they are.

But they're only one part of the problem.

The way of the the American system is to just get in there and shoot anyone who moves and pile up the bodies until everyone throws up their hands and says "OKAY! OKAY -- ENOUGH!"

That's the American Way -- from the Plymouth Rock wars with the locals to the French and Indian Wars to the Trail of Tears to Mexico to Cuba to Haiti, China, Panama, Nicaragua, and more --- nearly 200 separate shooting wars between the founding and the Bicentennial celebration.

That's what we do -- maybe THE ONLY THING we do well...

And maybe -- to use the idiotic generalization those government and financial people so often use -- maybe "That's the only language those people understand."

(Why should Mexican drug cartel people get to have all the fun?")

Yeah -- I know this is hideously irresponsible and I would be just as culpable as Glen Beck or Rush Limbaugh if people actually did it.

But they're not doing it for or because of me.

Or as one Iraqi vet said a while back in an interview: "We got a lot of people over here who are doing nothing but getting year after year of special weapons training."

You know -- sowing and reaping?
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MY DISCLAIMER HERE --- I'm not advocating or trying to incite anyone to violence against those people who lie and steal from us and who dishonor their basic protoplasm -- I'm just doing my Cassandra thing -- the violence is already here --- the anger against the greedheads is already here --- god knows the guns are all already here -- I'm just looking ahead to what I see coming -- and it might piss people off that I'm not being judgmental about it, not opining as to it being good or bad -- it's not about whether or not those people DESERVE to be offed or kidnapped -- people don't get what they deserve -- they get what they resemble -- it's just about the functional dynamic that and that's the way I see it playing out.

Of course, it's POSSIBLE something(s) could be done to alter that outcome, but I have no idea what that would be. So. like waiting for Rescue Me to finally get the new season up and running, all I can do is wait and see.


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4/3/09

The Creationist Clown shows up again...


THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: April 3, 2009

RICHMOND -- Former GOP presidential contender Mike Huckabee exhorted Virginia Republicans to rally votes for their governor's race this fall. And if that doesn't work, well, flatten the Democrats' tires and keep 'em home, he joked...

But former Democratic National Chairman Terry McAuliffe isn't laughing. In a media conference call yesterday, McAuliffe said denying people the right to vote is "not a laughing matter."

Huckabee, through a spokesman yesterday, ridiculed McAuliffe for criticizing his remarks.

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Well wottehell, Archie -- Schmuckabee also ridicules people who believe in evolution, in women's rights, and suchlike stuff.

Since 2000, Repugnicans making jokes about interfering with Democrats' right to vote, haven't been funny, but instructional.

Isn't that what people always say?

"Oh it was just a joke... "

Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck, et al...

"I didn't really mean anyone should lynch black men."

"I didn't really mean anyone should kill doctors who perform abortions."

"I didn't really mean anyone should scream obscenities at teenage girls trying to go into Planned Parenthood."

"I didn't really mean we should kill all the Muslims."

"I didn't mean kill 'em or convert them to Christianity."

"I didn't really mean I wanted the president to fail -- just the things he does."

"I didn't mean anything when I said it was cold in here so throw another Jew on the fire."

"JEEZUS CHRIST -- LIGHTEN UP!

GET A SENSE OF HUMOR! IT WAS JUST A JOKE."


The late Steve Allen once pointed out that laughter is just the civilized way of showing your teeth.

So when someone does a performance art bit and hangs from a cross with only a breech clout on and says "Hey -- I'm God. So if you want to be saved, get down on your knees and eat me," lighten up -- it's just a joke.

or

When a magazine editor does an obvious jape about a self-righteous preacher's first sexual experience being with his mother in an outhouse -- lighten up -- it's just a joke.

or

When a theological historian points out the OBVIOUS homosexuality of Jesus and his boys, and suggests there was a whole lot of butt-fucking going on at the last supper and that what they were eating was each other -- HEY! Lighten up -- it's just a joke.


Funny, right? Ha-Ha.

There's a reason why so many people hate and fear clowns, because they see the cruelty under the joke.


Governor Huckabee -- Fuckabee you where you breathe.

You make the best case for retroactive abortion we've seen in a long time.

(Lighten up -- it's just a joke.)

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