I always recoil at how many awful, patriot-type songs people allow into their Fourth of July barbecue iPod mixes, especially when there are so many great anthems to choose from. This year was no different. What follows is a list of songs commonly heard on Independence Day. I will analyze each and determine whether you should include or exclude them from your barbecue playlist next year. (more…)

“I am not a citizen of the world. I think the entire concept is intellectual nonsense and  stunningly dangerous!” —Newt Gingrich

Wow, Newt, you really are a retard.

Now, it should be noted that I do not intend for the word “retard” to be insulting to our mentally handicapped brothers and sisters (Newt gives retards a bad name); rather, “retarded” is meant in its truer, original sense, as in, “regressive,” “stunted” and / or “expressing non-progressive thinking or behavior.” Because that’s exactly what this is—yet another flailing neo-conservative, detached from power and still clinging to the same, goonish, approach to global affairs that nearly ruined us in the first place. (more…)

“All of them, any of them that have been in front of me over the years…with a great appreciation for the press, the media.” (Sarah Palin, when asked to name a newspaper she reads.)

Never have I heard such duplicitous poppycock in the political arena as from vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

This is the woman who claimed to have foreign-policy experience because she can see Russia from Alaska, said the causes of global warming are unimportant to the solution and insulted Joe Biden for being old (um, hello? John McCain, hello?) and then spun it as a compliment.

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I heard it again–that phrase, that phrase, that awful phrase that I hate so much. It was spoken on The O’Reilly Factor. The panel was discussing Iraq in their typical fair and maliced manner, when one of them uttered the unutterable: He said the war in Iraq is necessary because we are “spreading democracy” in the region.

Spreading democracy?

I remember the first time I heard those words. It was during President Bush’s 2005 inaugural address: “It is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture…. We’re spreading democracy.”

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Have you noticed how every song written about September 11 sucks major ass juice? Writing songs about 9/11 is cheap. Who needs original thought when all you have to do is regurgitate September 11 catchphrases and suddenly you got tears flowing and hands holding and voices singalonging and people applauding you for displaying such meaningful sorrow. It’s like when the opening band shouts out the name of the headliner because it’s a guaranteed reaction-getter.

For two straight evenings, I traversed a maze of web rings like Songs of Memory and Heal the Pain We Bear – consisting of dozens and dozens of obscure, mediocre artists. For two nights, Woodbridge red at my side, I listened to their laments about September 11, 2001. Oh Christ, how I twisted in my headphones; each website, each song – just another jagged stone in an avalanche of suck.

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A few nights ago, on his radio show, Matt Drudge played a clip of filmmaker David Lynch talking on Dutch television about several 9/11 conspiracy theories, such as how the towers crumbled like a controlled demolition project, or that the size of the hole in the Pentagon was allegedly too small to have been created by a Boeing 757.

Unsurprisingly, Drudge berated him for even considering the theories. I don’t remember exactly what he said, but it was your basic, right-wing, reactionary, “don’t-question-authority” rant you would expect from a Matt Drudge type.

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Tuesday:
They took Mrs. Bloomingberger today. I was washing a rack of dishes and could see through the kitchen window as the Support the Troops Police marched up to her apartment, bashed down the door and dragged the poor old gal away. They said she didn’t support The Troops enough.

I thought she supported The Troops just fine. You know, baked them cookies, sent them pen-pal letters–the weekly minimum amount of supporting The Troops, as required by law. Of course, Mrs. Bloomingberger wished she could support The Troops even more. She just loved those boys. But she was an elderly widow and couldn’t get around the house like she used to. Baking cookies was a job in and of itself these days, especially when you bake them from scratch.

Not that any of this mattered to the Support the Troops Police. They deemed it “insufficient” that she only supported The Troops the minimum amount as required by law. So a new law was drafted to expedite her arrest. It was called the Patriot Act XIII and it mandated that all citizens were legally required to do more for The Troops than was the weekly minimum legal requirement and that they could monitor your emails and phone calls to make sure you were complying.

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