Captain Planet gets his ass kicked

so in case you aren't aware, the world is falling apart. let me rephrase: humans are are tearing the world apart. let me rephrase again, humans from western culture are tearing the world apart. there really is nobody else to blame. are wolves tearing the world apart? no. they're just getting shot to shit by Sarah Palin from her helicopter. and by the way, if that doesn't SCREAM cheap shot, nothing does.

I don't know if you've been paying attention to the news surrounding the BP oil, or trying to jam scissors in your ears every time you hear about it out of despair, like i have; but as it turns out things are not going so great. more to the point, we're screwed. i've always liked george carlin's bit about how we always talk about saving the earth, but honestly the earth will survive, humans are fucked. i think climate change, war, and dumb shit like this huge oil spill make that pretty obvious. however the question remains: how many other species are we gonna take with us?whats your bet? 200? interesting you should say that, because here is a fun fact: 200 species of plants or animals go extinct EVERY DAY. wanna blame that on anybody besides humans and our so called "progress"? who? is it the fault of sea lions? maybe oak trees. how about eggplants. eggplants and their growth and expansion are causing the extinction of 200 plants and animals every day. hmmm…. nope still bullshit. its humans. always will be. at least until we "go dinosaur" and disappear and nature decides to evolve another species into dominant territory. by the way, my bet is on squirrels. i can see it in their eyes. oh the want you to think they are just collecting nuts, but deep down: genocide.

wait, no. thats still just humans.

anyways, back to the environmental catastrophe of a lifetime. who's lifetime? certainly not the shit-tons of animals already dead from getting covered with oil. their lifetimes are over. its cool though. its not like sea turtles are supposed to live a long time. and frankly pelicans were getting a little to high and mighty for my tastes and its nice to see them taken down a few pegs. and by taken down a few pegs i mean smothered in oil, dying with their skin melting off. but who cares right? its not like they are human. its not like the earth is a complicated system that is interconnected. its not like the death of an ecosystem will effect people. its not like we all completely in denial. completely. in denial. 100%. its not like thats whats going on. at all.

speaking of denial, thats the first thing BP did when the Deepwater Horizon exploded; deny deny deny. everything is fine. nobody died. nothing happened. i wish i could have been there for that exec meeting at BP where they are trying their hardest to find a way to spin this. "ok… can we somehow blame illegal immigrants? is this in anyway the fault of taxes?" and then one guy is like "to get the liberals on our side, lets blame Halliburton!" "Good work Jones!" this of course would have to be scrapped, since there is no way to specifically connect illegal immigrants to the spill and tax cuts for oil companies are approved by sellout liberals AND conservatives. the Deepwater Horizon actually HAD contracted Halliburton…but c'mon who cares about that Cheney shit anymore, right? its not the last administrations fault its this one's. unless we are talking about 9/11. that was ALL clinton. and carter. not reagan though.

from denial we move to blame. and as always, blame never lands on "us". it never "our" fault. its always the ~fill in the blank~ 's fault. for instance, the Conservatives blame Obama, while trying to shake the embarrassing mantra of the 2008 RNC “Drill, Baby Drill!”. Yes, they actually chanted that. i remember it because i remember watching the RNC at an apartment in DC saying "who the hell is Sarah Palin? and then 40 minutes later, saying "HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! holy shit! THATS MCCAIN'S RUNNING MATE?!?!?!" little did i know the joke was on me.and the rest of the world

but still… really? her?

Glenn Beck is actually planning on doing a one hour piece on the the irony of the whole "drill baby drill" situation. i'm joking. he just gonna continue to be awful.

The Liberals blame Bush, or Cheney, or Blackwater, or if possible James Dobson, conveniently forgetting that Obama has been ok with environmentally harmful crap from day one: offshore drilling, “clean” coal, nuclear power, its all good according to Captain Hopenchange. i have a vivid, then blurry memory of Obama talking about the awesomeness of offshore drilling at a state of the union. vivid, because it enraged me, blurry because i took a shot every time he said something vaguely inspiring, but not pertaining to the point. or reality. or facts. but yeah,CHANGE and stuff. and we did something about healthcare..right? wait, did we? did they already vote on that? was that the thing with that plumber guy? wait no… hope…something about hope? didn't we…. don't ask, don't tell… no they're still working on that. hmm… i'll think of it.

but it never takes long to move from catastrophe to utter stupidity. for instance, Obama has called for a sensible energy policy. and by sensible i mean apocalyptic. while realizing that we need to wean ourselves from the addiction to oil we have (a epiphany that even George W. had, so its not saying much), he has decided that weaning ourselves off oil really means killing ourselves, by "... tapping into our natural gas reserves, and moving ahead with our plan to expand our nation’s fleet of nuclear power plants."

i love how he calls our abomination of nature's key to existence a "fleet". i wonder what sort of quote he'll give when, NOT IF, but when we have a Deepwater Horizon-like disaster with a nuke plant in the US. "we need to halt slow down our dependence on world-destroying nuclear power. the key is now lots and lots of hamsters in wheels." lets just hope hamsters haven't been one of the 200 a day by then.

but don't worry all you Whole Foods liberals out there. i'm done trashing on Obama for the moment. so no you can feel comfortable again. no need to think about the idea that the Democrats and politics in general are a placebo to make you feel like you are doing something while the world falls apart. give some money to that non-profit. buy that t-shirt made from organic hemp. buy something fair trade. but no matter what, spend money. lots and lots of money. because thats progressive, right?

speaking of delusion, lets talk about the Conservatives again. Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisana has recently called for a repeal on the ban of offshore drilling. that right. the state so far most affected by the oil spill, wants to open up the possibility for more oil spills. why? because the original oil spill has impacted the Louisiana economy so much, that they need the extra money from the new oil. let me repeat that. the solution to the problem, is more of the problem. now thats some sound thinking. thats up there with "the reason the hate us is because we have so many troops in their country. so to make them not hate us, lets send more troops to their country. weird that didn't work. WHY DO THEY HATE US!?!??!?!"

its gets better. both Texas governor Rick Perry, and Oklahoma House Rep,Tom Cole have said that the oil spill was an act of God. which god they meant, is still in question. my bets are on Odin. that bearded fuck has been pissed since Zuul dissed him at the inter-faith mixer at the Applebee's in Malden.

but here is the moment we've all been waiting for. the Queen of Lowered Expectations would not stay silent during the tragic time for out country. as always, Sarah Palin had something inspiring, patriotic and uninformed to say about the matter at hand. She knew who was really to blame for the BP oil spill: environmentalists. i really don't know how to joke about this one, so i'll just lay it out. her reasoning for blaming environmentalists for the oil spill, is that the only reason we were offshore drilling in the first place, is that those tree hugging hippies blocked us from drilling for oil in the Alaskan Nature Preserve, so we had to do offshore drilling. and therefore, it is the environmentalists fault. what a terribly unintelligent human being.

by the way, Sarah Palin also accused Obama of being in the pocket of big oil. this is true, he along with every other president of the past 50 years has been a flunky of the oil companies. here is the funny part about Palin saying that. Her husband, Todd, used to work for BP. he actually worked for the company responsible for this mess! its not like he worked for Texaco or some shit, and she can be all "Texaco is great, is that British Petroleum, thats the problem" Her husband actually was employed by the problem and she wants to convince us that OBAMA has ties to the oil companies. maybe i've been wrong about her and she just gets this whole "PR" thing better than anyone else. just say something with no factual backing, wave a flag, something negative about the mainstream media (not mentioning of course that you actually work for the most popular news channel in the states), say something offensive about immigrants, something about "our" forefathers, wink and you're golden.

ok so enough with politicians. lets talk about the company that started this all. BP. hey did you know that BP stands for British Petroleum? well it does. so now you know. and knowing is half the battle. However a few years ago when "going green" got cool, or at least profitable, BP spent a very large amount on revamping their image. the end result was an ad campaign that used the initials "BP" to stand for "Beyond Petroleum". the meaning was the since we all know that oil is gonna run out sometime soon, BP is committed to finding new solutions other than oil for energy. but here is the best part. to this day, BP has spent more money on the "Beyond Petroleum" campaign itself (meaning ads, PR, rebranding etc.) than actually working on moving beyond petroleum. these are the people now in charge of cleaning up the gulf. i do not feel secure.

wanna know another reason i don't feel secure? it was recently released that in the response plan that BP had on file for such distasters specific to the Gulf of Mexicoas like Deepwater Horizon, one of the experts to contact for dealing with the effect on wildlife was Professor Peter Lutz. guess what? HE"S DEAD. no not from shock over the oil spill. i really don't know how he died. however i do know that he died in 2005. 5 FUCKING YEARS AGO! nice contingency plan.

luckily the plan also lists how to deal with the effect of oil on such animals as sea otters, seals, walruses and sea lions. i love sea otters. they are amazingly adorable animals. so while i'm glad that BP has a plan to deal with the effect of an oil spill, specific to the Gulf of Mexico, on sea otters, and their friends seals, sea lions and walruses, i'm a little worried about the fact that BP doesn't know that NONE OF THESE ANIMALS LIVE IN THE GULF OF MEXICO! who the hell does the research at BP? do they not have wikipedia? isn't this a billion dollar corporation? who let the dogs out?

Environmental catastrophe is terrible wherever it happens, but the US population rarely if ever notices. the only reason we give a shit now, is because it’s in our backyard. We have exported our problems for so long that we don’t know how to react when it happens to us. It was the same with 9/11. The very idea that someone would attack the US is out of the question. That’s why many people are still seething with anger over the 9/11 attacks, but can’t understand why the majority of Iraq hates us even though well over 100,000 Iraqi civilians are dea because of us.

Exporting suffering while importing benefits is what keeps our U.S. society going. We don’t have to deal with labor disputes like we did in the 1920’s because we’ve shipped all the cheap labor somewhere else. We don’t see the 14 year old child sewing our jeans, we just see how great our ass looks in those jeans. We don’t see the massive deforestation in South America, we just see that coffee table that really pulls the room together. And until recently, we didn’t see the negative side of drilling for oil, just that sweet ass car, or shiny new computer, or amazing piece of crap, or whatever else. But now we can’t turn away. actually we can. and we do. you are about to. but don't worry. everything will be fine. worst case scenario is what? the local ecosystem is permanently damaged? the oil gets pulled into gulf streams and spread throughout the ocean? the oceans become toxic? the basis for life as we know it is changed for the worse? we all die? the earth heals itself?squirrels become the dominant species?

maybe. sleep tight.

seriously though, can Louisiana catch a break?

Holy Shit.

Religion. what a fun topic. nothing brings out more foam at the mouth from everyone than religion. be it believers or non-believers, everybody gets riled up talking about religion. i feel no need to attack religion itself. plenty of smarter, cleverer and British-er people have done it before me, so really there is no point..

However personal takedowns about specific people... yes that is my cup of tea. There are so many public figures involved in modern religion today that it seems almost silly to pick on one specific person. i should also be upfront and say that i think if you meet one person who claims to be of a certain belief system, and you can't stand them, it doesn't mean that everyone who has similar beliefs are also jackasses, or that those those beliefs themselves are bad.

So... with that said... today i want to talk about a man named Mark Driscoll.

Mark Driscoll is the hip, young(ish) leader of a church in Seattle called Mars Hill. Mars Hill is named after the famous Seattle candy flood, when the Mars Bar factory exploded and sent melted chocolate every where. most of the chocolate gravitated towards one area and when it solidified, it made a hill of Mars Bar chocolate, or "Mars Hill". I might be a little off on some of these details, but that is basically it.

Driscoll has gained notiriety over the last couple years for being a bastard. I'm sorry, i mean pastor. He is part of a growing movement to make men in the Christian church become "Real Men". Not that sissy hippy shit that people like Shaine Claiborne, Rob Bell and Jesus Christ talk about. He has often said that too many churches have been "chickified". Being a former member of a frat, i'm not sure he knows that "chickified" is not a word. But to his credit, making up things can be fun. imaginary friends, alter egos, god; imaginations are wonderful things!

Here are some of his beliefs that he preaches:

homosexuality is a sin, but so is sex before marriage or outside of marriage. marriage is specifically for a biological man and a biological woman.

women may not be leaders in a church, i.e.: pastors, priests, reverends, etc...

women may not ask a man on a date.

the man is the head of the household and the woman is subservient to him

a man may not be a stay at home dad.

yup, all that and looks to.

an issue he often talks about is how there are not enough young men in church. and so his approach has been to make church cool. while preaching he often wears hip clothes like a t-shirt with Jesus at a set of turntables, or Paul hitting a woman.

Being the patriarch that he is (a wife, 5 kids and counting) one of his main messages is that men need to stand up and be men. men men men. stop being not-men, and be men. He says that the church loses men because its feminine, and there are too many girly things in it. for instance, here is an actual quote from this guy:
"The problem with our churches today is that the lead pastor is some sissy boy who wears cardigan sweaters, has The Carpenters dialed in on his iPod, gets his hair cut at a salon instead of a barber shop, hasn’t been to an Ultimate Fighting match, works out on an elliptical machine instead of going to isolated regions of Russia like in Rocky IV in order to harvest lumber with his teeth, and generally swishes around like Jack from Three’s Company whenever Mr. Roper was around."

thats a real quote. he said this. to people.

part of the hilarity of this Sports Center reject's message is that even his incredibly offensive definition of "real men" is not an actualization of the stereotype itself. the idea that WATCHING Ultimate Fighting Championship makes you a real man. just watching it. not actually fighting, but watching. he can't even take this masculine stereotype to the level of participation and say that men should be fighting. being masculine is watching other people do stuff.

He does make a good point about Christianity becoming too feminine. when i think of this religion with a male God, male Savior, mostly men speaking from the pulpit, a rule book that says women cannot preach or be leaders and should be subservient to their husbands, my first thought is : whoa, there are way too many women here! what is this, a maxi pad convention? let play some fucking HALO 3!" and then i high five some dudes. after all, bros before ho's.

His claim in a youtube video that church is too "feminine" because "all the innovative dudes are home watching football, or they're out making money, or climbing a mountain, or working on they're truck", begs the question; is he a pastor or the PR guy for SPIKE TV? seriously, after watching a bunch of his sermons, i kept waiting for him to say, "and now what we've all been waiting for; girls jumping on trampolines!"

what is innovative about ANY of those activities. nothing. none of those activities are innovative. they aren't bad activities to take part in per say, but innovative? making money? CLIMBING A MOUNTAIN? look, i love hiking and climbing. its really fun. but its not innovative. i mean its practically the opposite of innovative. people have be doing it for hundreds of thousands of years. oh whoops, sorry i mean 6 thousand years.

even if one gives him the benefit of the doubt and says he is making the point that truly innovative PEOPLE often aren't encouraged the right way, and often settle for less than they can achieve (and that is really stretching it) its a terrible point within his context. Innovation is exactly what the people he criticizes are doing. Encouraging people other than men to preach, accepting LGBTQ members into their communities, addressing poverty, criticizing capitalism are all (for Christianity, which isn't saying much) pretty fucking innovative. But Mark Driscoll doesn't actually want innovation, Mark Driscoll wants the 1950's.

Believe it or not, we have even gotten to the offensive part. In 2006 when mega-church leader Ted Haggard, a staunch opposer of gay rights was (surprise surprise) called out on having "relations" with a gay prostitute, Driscoll stepped up to point out the obvious cause: Haggard's wife.

I'll let the poet himself explain this one:
"Most pastors I know do not have satisfying, free, sexual conversations and liberties with their wives. At the risk of being even more widely despised than I currently am, I will lean over the plate and take one for the team on this. It is not uncommon to meet pastors' wives who really let themselves go; they sometimes feel that because their husband is a pastor, he is therefore trapped into fidelity, which gives them cause for laziness."

Ah yes, because the reason men cheat is not because they are untrustworthy to begin with, addicted to power, don't respect women, live in a culture that encourages it, or can't deal with the often unrealistic expectations of monogamous life and don't have the guts to have an open relationship or at least least discuss these problems with their wives. no no no, the reason men cheat, is because their wives have gotten ugly. or fat. or fat and ugly.

thank you Mark for showing the us the light.

here's a fun nugget i pulled off his wikipedia page:
"There is a strong drift toward the hard theological left. Some emergent types [want] to recast Jesus as a limp-wrist hippie in a dress with a lot of product in His hair, who drank decaf and made pithy Zen statements about life while shopping for the perfect pair of shoes. In Revelation, Jesus is a prize fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is a guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper, halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up. I fear some are becoming more cultural than Christian, and without a big Jesus who has authority and hates sin as revealed in the Bible, we will have less and less Christians, and more and more confused, spiritually self-righteous blogger critics of Christianity."

plenty of things to say, but only gonna say one: "I cannot worship a guy I can beat up". um... i thought the thing about Jesus was that he could get beat up? i mean wasn't there a hit movie a few years ago that was nothing but Jesus getting his assed kicked for 2 hours? isn't that supposed be the whole fucking point? maybe not. after all im just a "self-righteous blogger critic of Christianity".

Dricoll was also featured on a debate on ABC. the name of this debate was... i can't believe i am saying this...."Does Satan Exist?"

this was an actual debate. on TELEVISION. "Does Satan Exist?" Four people actually spent an hour in front of a live audience debating whether or not there is a guy named Satan, and if he is king of hell. and people watched. it seems like a bad skit. the whole time i was waiting for Deepak Chopra to be all, "and so the existence of Satan is not provable because LIVE FROM NEW YORK, ITS SATURDAY NIGHT!!!!"
but that never happened.

In Driscoll's opening statement of the debate, he had this to say on the subject:
"Satan was an angel who rebelled against god. In so doing led an insurrection. Other angels followed him. Our first parents (Adam and Eve, NOT STEVE!) joined that rebellion, and ultimately that is the cause of moral evil. it is rebellion against god."
he then followed up with, "One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them."

Driscoll addresses issues like atheism by not actually addressing it. During a segment of a recent sermon, Driscoll threw the usual "isn't the idea of no god really scary" routine at the audience, while not addressing the scientific realities of hard agnosticism or atheism. I have heard this and seen this before. instead of dealing with with the actual idea of is there a god or not, people go straight to "well i would really prefer to live in a world where there is a god." this is all nice and good, but doesn't change a damn thing. i would love to live in a world with genuine equality. but genuine equality doesn't exist just because i want it to. and if i am gonna criticize those who believe that genuine equality DOESN"T exist, i sure as hell better have a more thought out argument than "because if it doesn't exist, that would suck."

the most offensive bit of his sermon on atheism, is his notion that suicide is the likely end for someone who doesn't believe in his god. i feel no need to make a joke about this, but only to say in my personal experience on the issue of suicide, Driscoll's assessment could not be more opposite of the truth.

Mark Driscoll is just some person in Seattle. I shouldn't really care about people like him if i disagree. But unfortunetely i do care. Mark Driscoll makes me embarrassed to be a man. Hell, Mark Driscoll makes me embarrassed to be a human. He is everything i have ever thought was wrong with religion, which is why i don't bother anymore. As the book of Revalations says:

"And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Mark Driscoll, he was a total assclown and Hell followed with him"

Your Life: the video game!!!

Do you remember when you could play video games and not have to worry about...well anything?
video games have always been a nice form of escapism for me. be it the girl in junior high who didn't like me, or the pain from knowing that girl didn't like me, or the nightly sob-fests from thinking about the girl who didn't like me, video games could always step into my sad little world and say "why are you crying? you're not a loser! you are a gigantic toad carrying a battle axe!"
or maybe it would say, "the teachers think you aren't smart? thats interesting, since you just SAVED THE HUMAN FUCKING RACE FROM ALIENS!"
or "nobody likes you? well too bad for them, because you just put a whole bunch of colored blocks on other colored blocks to make them disappear!

for whatever reason, my life is just not as exciting as video games. if a video game was made of my life, it would be called "Sad Guy" .

it would consist of only one level, where each morning i would wake up at the crack of noon, take a super long pee, eat something left over from the night before, tell myself i should read, but actually go online for a fews hours where i get depressed about how everyone else's life is more exciting than mine, watch TV, eat more food, drink some beer, fall asleep. sounds riveting right? and here's the best part of the game: you never win, you just do it over and over until you turn 40 and then wonder why you're not "punk" anymore.

if only there was a way to play a video game, and then live that out in real life....

there is a way!!!! at the THE ARMY EXPERIENCE CENTER!!!!!!!

thats right, at a mall in Philly you can have the experience of both playing video games, AND throwing your life away, AT THE SAME TIME!!!

in this high-tech facility, you can test your patriotism by getting into a real HUMVEE on front of a huge screen and shooting at "the bad guys". How will you know that bad guys? they're the ones with the guns, obviously. unless they show up at an Obama rally, then they are just normal citizens exercising their rights, to be assholes and get on the news.

but don't forget, just like in the real Army, if you shoot civilians, you lose points. not that those points actually mean anything. just like in real life, nobody counts how many "civilian lives" or "points" get taken away by the US Army. so not a real big deal. but still.... try not to aim at kids, ok?

what's this? we can get into a helicopter?!?!?!? and shoot people?!?!?! AMAZING!!!!!!!!

oh wait i forgot...its just a video game. poop.
But is it?!?!? After all the helicopter does have the illusion of being at a height where you can't actually see who you're hitting, but at least you know you're killing people!


But i thought real soldiers were gonna be here. i want to talk to actual heroes! Well guess what ya little statistic?!?! the AEC is fucking chock full of recruiters who are desperate to get some kid to sign his life away just as long as they themselves don't have to go back to that god-forsaken land! YAY! America!

and the best part? the soldiers are dressed like they work at Best Buy, because nothing says "real american hero" like khakis and a polo. Kids aren't stupid these days, they know when they are being sold something. But luckily they don't know when they are SELLING something. like their souls.


Sure this all sounds cool, but I'm someone who is more influenced by famous people. well guess what?!?!?! the AEC has had some famous visitors as well! random-ass NFL players showed up to play video games against actual soldiers at the " Which of us are Worse Role Models?" Tournament.

Also, Playboy model and 2008 "Cyber Girl of the Year" Jo Garcia stopped by the AEC to once again let girls know that while they technically are allowed to enlist, we'd all really prefer it if they'd just remain sexual objects.

but here is the most exciting part!

everyone who goes to the AEC has the option of taking the "life of a solider" tour. if you're wealthy, you get to take the "life of a commanding officer tour". if you're gay you get to take the "killing kids is ok, destroying countries, no biggie. and yet somehow in this day in age we just can't wrap our heads around this whole "gay" thing" tour.


on the "life of a soldier" tour, you follow the life of "Jimmy" a kid who just wanted to go to college, but didn't have the money. you start in a mall, where Jimmy is cornered by Army recruiters. There, they tell him that (if he lives) the army will pay for his college (if he lives) and set him up for life (if he lives), and give him the job training he needs to succeed, if in fact he lives.

in the next room of the tour, Jimmy says goodbye to his parents. its quite emotional, and a Creed song plays in the background while Jimmy walks away. from there you get to see him humiliated at boot camp, where angry pieces of shit yell at him and call him "faggot". after his spirit is gone, he learns how to become an emotionless machine. during this montage, "Eye of the Tiger" plays. soon he is deployed to a country he has never heard of fighting "rebels" he has never heard of for reasons he doesn't understand. the "rebels" turn out to be normal people from the town he is deployed to who just want to live in peace. but he kills them anyway. in SLOW MOTION! during this "Hey Hey We're the Monkees" is played. its very "art-house"

after being redeployed several times, Jimmy comes home to a family he doesn't recognize, a world he can't relate to, and a life he doesn't want.
at that point, the tour speeds up 30 years and those on the tour are brought outside to the alley behind mall, where they can see IN PERSON the real-life Jimmy, collecting cans in a shopping cart. the recruiters then let everyone know that "We take care of our Vets! but not actually"

but speaking of real American heroes, the AEC is screening the live-action movie "G.I. JOE: the Rise of Cobra" tonight!!!! for FREE!!! it stars that guy from the mummy, that guy from that dance movie, that guy from "Brick" who should know better, the British girl who can't act, that guy who who was in "Inner Space", one of the Wayans brothers, and that guy from the Acura ads! its a veritable who's who of people nobody gives a shit about!

i know what you are all saying, "that sounds great!!!! i want to join the Army!" but this is a big decision. and you really need to think about whether or not you want to be a hero, or a commie piece of shit. those are you choices.

no pressure.


go joe!

best movie ever

An idea popped into my head the other day and i want to share it with the world. I often look at other people's lives and experiences and think "damn. my life is boring, everybody else is waaaay more exciting than me."

now while this is factually accurate, its not really healthy. and so i have been wondering how to get over this. and i think i have it: pretend my life is a movie.

hear me out. in real life, when you tell your Temp agency that the one area you don't want to work is the government, and the next place they assign you is the US Courts, that is terrible. but in a movie its HILARIOUS! what's that you say? unbeknownst to you the project they made you work on the whole time turned out to be a racist program with the specific intent of railroading undocumented immigrants into prison? thats awful! oh wait its in a movie? FUNNIEST FUCKING THING I'VE EVER HEARD! you obsess about wanting to lose weight, yet your diet regularly includes beer, pizza, and ice cream? CAN'T WAIT TO SEE THE SPECIAL FEATURES!

it doesn't have to be depressing though. think about when there is a character you really like in a movie. they've been through some shit, right? they worked some terrible jobs, but made the best of it, right? when i think about my worst job ever, now i laugh. but it took me about 5 years to do that. it was at a movie theatre by the way. well actually its tied with the 1 hour i worked at a phone bank before walking out after hearing the 3rd person in a row call a certain current president a nasty word that starts with "N". and no its not "nincompoop"

Maybe you should imagine your life is like a TV show. The Office is one of the biggest shows on television and everybody's life on that show SUCKS! i mean sure pam and jim, blah blah blah, but lets be real: Jim has "cheater" written all over him. and eventually Pam is gonna blame Jim for her failure as an artist. but for now, its adorable!

the most important thing about your movie is that you HAVE to be the main character. this may sound arrogant, but if you start thinking of yourself as a side character it will end badly. "but wait, you're saying, what about all the side characters in movies who are great?" Doesn't matter. Sure nobody wants to be Jon Favreu's character and everyone all want to be Vince Vaughn's character in "Swingers", but for real, the character must have 27 STI's at this point. plus its so '96 to treat women like shit. Trust me, you need to be the star of your movie. The trajectory of the star is soooo much different than that of the sidekick.

For instance if your life is the 1985 film "Girls Just Want To Have Fun" and you are Sarah Jessica Parker, well done you! you will go on to have a successful life writing a column in the newspaper, buying lots of shoes, and hanging out with women you secretly hate, but pretend to be your best friends. also you marry Ferris Bueller.

However if your life is the 1985 film "Girls Just Want To Have Fun" and you are Shannen Doherty, woe is you. you will be forever known as the annoying high school kid who left a terrible show about annoying high school kids because you couldn't get along with the other annoying high school kids. you'll drink alot. you will go on play a witch on a show with other washed up actresses, and host a reality show on the Sci-Fi channel. also you will be the worst part of a Kevin Smith movie, which is saying something.

Being in you own movie is even easier now that everyone has iPods. you can have a soundtrack to your life, while you are living your life. if you are worried something terrible is about to happen to you, like someone is chasing you or broke into your house, just change your music to something happy, and i'm sure everything will be alright. but not something TOO happy, because then maybe your movie is one of those sketchy horror movies where they play over-the-top happy music while someone gets murdered. like the opening scene to "Deep Red". shit is disturbing.

now i know what you are wondering, and yes Jude Law does play me in my movie. Denzel Washington is my best friend. Judi Dench is my love interest (shut it, she rules) and my dog will be played by a bear.

also i can fly, have super strength, and know how to make a mean falafel.

No sir, you are the one who is the liar.

So.... i don't know if you know this, but prior to Kanye West interrupting country music's latest attempt to kill itself, there was another outburst all over the news. On Wednesday september something something blah blah blah, President Barack Obama was delivering what some might call an incredibly important speech. Others might call it an hour of my life i'll never get back. During this speech, he said his health care plans would not provide care for illegal immigrants, or as the Native Americans used to call them "Europeans". It was during this fateful statement that Congresswhiteman Joe Wilson from South Carolina yelled "You lie!"

As soon as this was yelled, the room went silent, and Obama stood there staring at the camera. The camera panned to Michelle who looked to be on the verge of tears. and then the president of the united states just broke down and cried, saying "you're right! oh god what have i done?!?!?!" and from then on, no presidents ever lied again. the end.

so joe wilson yelled, and and everyone freaks outs, saying its super disrespectful. however to be fair, in South Carolina its considered disrespectful to even allow black people in the same room as whites, so really Wilson is a progressive.

Since this moment in really boring political history that won't matter in 2 let alone 20 years, Wilson has become the face of a movement. the rich, white, male face of a movement. I speak of course of the Tea Party or "rich whites who don't mind their neighbor's kids being killed for a lie, but sure as hell aren't gonna pay for that kid to be able to see a doctor" movement. i hesitate to call it a movement, but technically what i am about to leave in the toilet is a movement, so i suppose it fits.

But now that Wilson is the poster boy for things i don't care about, i figured i should give him something he really needs right now: attention.

So we all know what Wilson said to Barack Obama, but here is something you might not know, Joe Wilson's real name is Addison Graves Wilson! so right out the gate this guy is a liar. Obama should've been all "oh really ADDISON? i lie? at least i didn't change my name to "joe"! Shit, my first name sounds like a martial art, my middle name was a dictator, and my last name rhymes with a terrorist, and i got elected president of the united states. So tell me who's the liar Addison Graves Wilson sr.?!?!?!"

but obama didn't say that. and thats why the terrorists win.

but here are some other facts about joe wilson i know off the top of my head (aka wikipedia):

In 2002, Wilson was discussing with Rep. Bob Filner (D-CA) the possible (but not actual) Iraqi weapons of mass destruction or as the whole thing is now called "the mistake that we should never be forgiven for. ever."
Wilson flipped out on Filner for implying that the US sold Saddam Hussein chemical weapons back when...well back when we were in fact selling Saddam Hussein chemical weapons. Wilson later had to apologize, but i totally bet his fingers were crossed when he did.

once again to be fair, Most americans didn't know about Wikipedia until 2004 , so its totally ok that i'm a college drop-out and i know more about US foreign policy than an elected congressman.

Remember Strom Thurmond? Al Sharpton does. Strom Thurmond was a racist, segregationist senator who was elected and re-elected time and time again in, you guessed it, SOUTH CAROLINA! YAY! well, as i'm sure you all know now, it turns out that despite giving the longest filibuster (by a senator) in history to stop the Civil Rights Act of 1957,Thurmond had an secret child with his black house servant. This child, Essie-Mae Washington Williams, decided to wait until Thurmond died to reveal this to the world, which is REALLY unfortunate, because Thurmond lived to be 100 years old. This seems to be one of the truly sad ironies of our time, because if Thurmond had lived just 6 more years, he would've lived long enough to die from a heart attack from seeing a black man become president.

so what does this have to do with Wilson? Well when Essie-Mae revealed herself to be Thurmond's child, Wilson "publicly doubted" this, which is a nice way of saying he called her a liar on the news. Its not entirely clear if he yelled out "YOU LIE!" in the middle of her statement or not. Maybe he was saving that nugget of rhetorical eloquence for primetime. He then said that whether or not she was Thurmond's daughter, she should've kept it to herself, because it was just a big smear campaign to taint Thurmond. This is ironic since Thurmond was in fact a taint.

The family of Thurmond then announced that it was in fact true, Essie-Mae was Thurmond's child. So Wilson apologized. Then he said he STILL thought she shouldn't have revealed that Thurmond was her father. this is just silly. you can't apologize for something, and then just restate right afterwards and have that be ok. you can't say "i'm really sorry for calling you an asshole, but in my defense you are an asshole." thats not an apology, thats a lie, and as we all know, Joe Wilson doesn't like liars. although, apparently only if they're black. and not actually liars.


ok, now back to present-time Joe Wilson. you may think yelling "you lie!" at the president on national television would have a negative effect on someone's political future. But, within 48 hours of the incident with the president, Wilson received $750,000 in donations. which goes to show you just how fucked up this whole system is. may the circle be unbroken.

So if none of this matters, and nobody is gonna remember it in a year, why do we spend so much time on it? Why does the news cycle endless babble on about meaningless political minutia? To keep our minds away from the 2 wars (that we know about) we are fighting and shouldn't be? To keep us from ACTUALLY coming up with a solution to health care, like... giving people health care? to keep us from asking "how long until we just tear this fucker down??!?!?!"

come to think of it, those are all really good points. shit... why aren't we talking about this stuff? and why OH MY GOD CAN YOU BELIEVE WHAT KANYE DID?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!?! AND WHAT THE FUCK, PATRICK SWAYZE IS DEAD?!?!?!??!??!?! FIRST FARAH, THEN MICHAEL, NOW "THE SWAYZ"? LIFE IS JUST SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO UNFAIR!

nobody puts baby in the corner.

Mad as hell, and probably gonna take some more of it!

to be entirely honest i had something totally different planned for this blog today. but it has come to my attention that today is not just a Wednesday. today is TEA PARTY DAY!!!

thats right everybody, its time to get together and get pissed, REALLY PISSED! why? is it that we are still stuck in a war that we shouldn't have been in, in the first place, on top of which we have countless numbers off military bases around the world where we are not wanted? NO! ok, is it because we still support israel 100% despite the fact that they are attempting to destroy all of Gaza and wipe out the Palestinian people? NO! shit...ok, well how about the fact despite the efforts to shut down Guantanemo, prisoners are still being tortured there? NOPE! um...the fact that there is mercury used in High Fructose Corn Syrup which is in practically everything our culture eats, and the FDA doesn't seem to care? NO WAY!

ok i give up, what are we pissed about?

TAXES!!!

ok, sure, taxes suck. i'm with you! taxes should be abolished, because honestly the only way the State thrives is to feed off of taxes. DOWN WITH THE STATE! DOWN WITH TAXES!!! DOWN WITH....what?

oh, you don't want the state to go away? but without the state there is no taxes, so shouldn't that mean... wait, you just want lower taxes? well that won't really change much but i guess i'm on board. after all over 50% of all federal taxes go to the military death machine, so...

wait, its not the military budget that you have a problem with? no i don't really know what a "welfare queen" is, but yes, i suppose they do sound like terrorists.

Socialism? well i wouldn't go as far as the call this socialism, since the literal definition of socialism has nothing to do with this...

ok, you all get it. my joke is over. Today is Tea Party Day. It is a chance for people with way too much money in the first place to get out there and complain about the government taking their money. Because after all dissent is patriotic, unless its against the war...or the president...specifically the republican president.

The "party" has been promoted by such typically boring rightists as Michelle Malkin. Malkin as you may recall pushed for a boycott of Dunkin Donuts, after DD's spokesperson Rachel Ray wore what is known as a keffiyah in a Dunkin Donuts commercial. Sometimes keffiyahs are worn in solidarity with the Palestinian cause. Other times, they are just a fucking scarf. Had Malkin done any research should would have found out that other than apparently being a flag for terrorism that should be the reason to boycott a donut stand, keffiyahs are also issued to US soldiers in the middle east, as they are commonly considered one of the best types of coverings for some of the bizarre types of weather over there.

so that gives you an idea of who is leading the Tea Party movement.

I'm all for tea parties. Me and Freddy my stuffed dog/imaginary best friend have awesome tea parties all the time. but they involve listening to Andrew W.K. and high-fiving Freddy. Freddy is awesome.

By all means, go out today and protest. get pissed. I'm pissed! i made zilch this year, and still owe the stupid-ass State money. it sucks. but so does war. so does destroying the earth, so does torture, so does hate, so does patriarchy, so does capitalism.

are you pissed about those things too?

Because it comes down to this: if the only "injustice" that brings you out the streets to protest; if the only thing that makes you wanna throw a brick through a window; if the only thing that makes want to stand up and say "i'm mad as hell, and i'm not gonna take it anymore!" is that taxes are too high... you're probably an American.

VIVA POOP!

remember the good old days?

no? good, that's because they never existed. the sooner we admit that our country wasn't birthed out of some beautiful collection of past philosophies, and benevolent trials and errors to form our most great union, the sooner we can fix this pile of poo.

our country's guidelines (the declaration of independence, the constitution, the bill of rights, the idiot's guide to patriarchy) were all written by rich white men. now this may not seem like a big deal, because everything our society has been based on in the past couple hundred years has been run by rich white men.

but here is something you might not know: while everything was run by rich white men, rich white men were in fact NOT the only people to live on the earth! i know i know, pretty shocking. i personally all assumed that the entire earth was made of white men, until God decided one day to make women out of some ribs.

i mention this only because i personally find hard to believe that these men who "founded" our country had the interests of anyone other than themselves when they whipped out the quill and starting writing some scrolls.

these men who owned slaves and found no need for women to be a part of life other then cooking food and looking pretty (two things i'm awesome at). these men who slaughtered a nation of people because of "manifest destiny". if you are new to the term "manifest destiny", it comes from the original Latin phrase "manifesto destino" which translates to "genocidal self-entitlement".

because when we say "founded this country", what we really mean "tricked, diseased, and murdered the former inhabitants of this country." this is the history we all know, and yet nobody seems to be too bothered by it. i mean i don't know anyone who thinks that its good that a nation of native americans were slaughtered, but very few people seem to think about it too much. for instance, when was the last time you thought about it? a while ago? thats because you are a shit head. but don't worry, so am i.

think about this: we showed up and wanted the land. we killed the people on the land and took it. ok, so why can't we do that now? i'm not advocating murder, but frankly rent has been way too much for me, and i don't see why if murder and theft of land is good enough for our forefathers, its not good enough for me. why can't i cap my landlord and take his shit? oh right, jail. well i guess if the forefathers went to jail, then so should i. what? they didn't? they got to be presidents and statesmen? they died rich and in big houses? interesting.

now you maybe saying "reuben, it was all so long ago! i know it was awful, but why can't we just let it go now. its been over a hundred years!"
to this i will reply by paraphrasing the legendary Bill Hicks, and just say that i will stop talking about this, when other people stop talking about Jesus. Because honestly if we are talking about shelf-life on issues... well i think you get the point.

look, i am not saying that Thomas Jefferson didn't love his kids. Or that George Washington didn't care about nature. or that Adams wasn't the best kisser in the commonwealth. I am sure they all had good intentions. But good intentions only get you so far. and cruel intentions is a crappy movie with Reese Witherspoon.Not that we can claim to be better. After all our modern leaders have taken the murderous leanings of our former founders and turned destruction into an art.

Within the first 5 days of his presidency, Barak Obama had missiles shot into Pakistan killing 18 people. And he's the peace candidate.

i think the part of the problem is best summed up by former President George Bush , when he was still vice-president to our Lord and Savior Ronald Reagan. When the U.S. Navy shot down an Iranian passenger plane killing 290 civilians, he was asked if he would apologize for the action. to this he replied "I will never apologize for the United States — I don't care what the facts are... I'm not an apologize-for-America kind of guy."

ok, that was the president. of the united states. that wasn't some guy you got into an argument with in Poli Sci 101. that was the president of the united states. he's "not an apologize for American-kind-of guy". nope not him. he's more of a invade-Panama-and-Iraq-then-leave-both-countries-worse-then-when-he-found-it kind of guy.

he doesn't care what the facts are? really? because in high school i didn't care what the facts were. now all day i ask people what size latte they want. he got to be president.


so i know what you are thinking, "reuben you must lead us to a better tomorrow! become our president, our king, our emperor!" but i am sorry to say, i'm not gonna take the job. it doesn't pay very well, and you have to be a complete asshole to do it. but don't cry, for there is hope. now that you have gotten over the disappoint of me not becoming president you may wonder, "but if the constitution and all that other crap is illegitimate, what document should we base our society on?!?!"

anything. like seriously anything. Clifford the big red dog. everyone poops. goodnight moon. i mean why not, right? for instance, try this out; in Clifford the Big Red Dog, do they ever call slaves 3/5 of human beings? no? Alright! we're already doing better than the constitution!

i honestly think you could build a stable, non-hierarchical society with kids books. try a book like "everyone poops." think about that statement itself "everybody poops". we all poop. everyone of us. from sea to shining sea, everybody poops. you can ask someone "do you poop?" and they would say "why yes i do!" i'm getting chills right now!

Because even Clifford the big red dog (or maybe Tintin) would agree that we need to smash the state, but until then, maybe we can at the very least open up the dialogue about why we use arcane, racist and sexist documents to form our society, that were written by men who most likely didn't have the interests of the majority in mind when they wrote it. Maybe if they had read "everbody poops" they would realize we are all equal and all have the right to party.




except people from Rhode Island. fuck Rhode Island.