Punditry, It's a bloody infectious disease

MSNBC ran a Convention After Hours show - with Ron Reagan Jnr. and that wretched, wretched, worm lizard, Joe Scarsborough. I caught Day4, they were interviewing the crowd/delegates for reactions to the Kerry speech. Two observations:

1. The worm lizard shunned the black people. There were two black people primely positioned, begging for a say, the said worm lizard ignored them with brave effort. Nice one, Lizzie.
   
2. The people interviewed - white ones obviously - were trying so hard to sound like pundits themselves: scripted and programmed with the mandatory sport analogies. This one girl, you could see her pause, painfully searching her soul for the punditry she'd heard so often. Things like, "he touched on the issues; he connected with the voters; a homerun" Uhhhhh? Does nobody know how to speak sincerely, anymore? It's a fucking disease.
   

Speaking of Affleck

Ben Affleck should consider ditching his day-job. I hate the bastard with a passion, as an actor. He should quit acting. He sucks.

Oy, and then I saw him addressing a crowd of Florida delegates at some organized meet at the DNC. He is actually an effective speaker/politician in front of a crowd; very likable. He reminded me of footage I have seen of JFK Jnr introducing his uncle at a previous Convention: clearly tentative, but charming, convincing and sincere. Charming, convincing and sincere, to describe Ben Affleck? Oyi!

On Nov 2 - Class is cancelled, go vote dammit!

If I am teaching on Nov 2, I have just cancelled that session.

The assignment is, "go vote, take a picture of yourself at the voting station, and write a x-page assessment of the systems used."

That should pass for a technology assignment right? Whatever, I don't care.

Conventions, irrelevant?

The media have been going on about how irrelevant the Conventions have become, whatever that means? Irrelevant, to whom? Bill Maher had something funny to say about it. I actually enjoyed the DNC. I didn't watch every hour, so I didn't notice things like, "Ben Affleck was overexposed." I saw Affleck once the entire week. There were speakers, I definitely wanted to hear, and I heard them - everything else was coincidence of television placement and daily activities.

Dammit, there are a lot of tevisions on campus. Gym, libraries, bookstore, local pubs, piccola's.

DAY 4 of the DNC. Kerry Speaks, Makes a Convert of a Anybody-But-Bush Cohort

I was very nervous when Kerry stepped onto the podium, last night. The Dems had spent 4 days building him up, and frankly, I was starting to like the guy! But, I was petrified, he was going to blow it. Not that it mattered to me personally as such. I'm in the anything-but-Bush-Brigade. You could pick a goat to run the White House, I could care less. The choice though curious would be amusing, at least. There is nothing funny about Dubya.

I was pleasantly surprised last night, and I have listened to entire speeches from Kerry before! I remembered just one, until now. A few weeks ago, he gave a speech on education during the Brown vs. Board of Education commemorations. The content inspired a lot of thought and ideas, but by golly the only reason I kept listening was because I was packing to move house: I needed something to keep me calm in the face of traumatic decisions about throwing away a lot of shit, I had acquired over a few years. I said to my officemate, Kerry's actually really bright. Pheww! but for the days when brightness was a foregone conclusion in a President.

Last night, Kerry gave me goose bumps, not in a bad way, in a, "my god, i feel ya" kind of way. In the same way, that I think, my father was moved by what the Kennedys believed in and what the US stood for. Stuff that wore me out growing up. So, this entire week, my relationship with the US has undergone a revival --in spite of my annoying housemate.

After what I said previously about necessary and sufficient Bush-bashing, I was particularly pleased that Kerry threw the gauntlet and had saved the bashing for himself, as it were.

Interestingly enough, I thought he said absolutely nothing that would benefit my own demographic in a direct way -except may the environment (a public good). There was a lot of talk about children, and more children and families and still more families. Very tiring stuff ordinarily, but I fucking cheering!

Introduction to The Daily Show With Jon Stewart for the DNC Week

This week, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart have altered their announcer's introduction to the show to lend the proper gravitas to the DNC in Boston. It kills me every single time! It goes something like this:

Welcome to the Daily Show, .....yada, yada, yada .......broadcasting live from the DNC in Boston.......
Featuring,

• Black People,
• Trial Lawyers,
• Abortions for Everyone,
• Organized Labor,
• Godless Sodomites,
• Celebrities who believe in their hearts they are helping, but are not.

I am paraphrasing......

Paradigm Shifts, Juxtaposing Differences, and Slamming Dubya Policies

On a related story to Edwards speech.

Why is the media pretending that holding contrasting policies to Bush is not policy, or plan or strategy. Example: If my opponent believes in abortions-for-none, and I say I believe in abortions for all; really do I have to say more? What do you want to hear, how many abortion clinics I intend to build, where, and when and with who? Is that it? Screw you. What you wanna do with that? Argue that that's way too much money to spend on abortion clinics! There's no discussion to be had here. We disagree on a fundamental premise, the logical consequences of each are irrelevant to the other.

E.g., I support multilaterism, you don't. Does it matter how I go about winning friends and influencing people? No! You don't like people, you pinhead! What do you care? I have a plan, for one, I am not going to tell the UN Security Council, they are irrelevant, nor that the most powerful nations in the EU are "Old Europe" --- read "also irrelevant". There's a plan! And it costs me nothing for a start.

And the pundits, eating it up, hook, line and sinker: " Where's your plan?"

Pundits will blast you for having the charisma of a toad if, you so much as look like you want to detail your plan. Hyposhites.

Seriously, the differences between Dubya and Friends and John&John are fundamental, and of principle, they must be juxtaposed for clarity. We are not arguing semantics or relative differences (of degree). We are talking paradigm shifts here. The Democrats, under media and Republican pressure, are making a mistake by trying so hard to avoid juxtaposing the paradigmatic differences. In other words, the Bush-bashing, and so-called hatefest is necessary and hitherto, insufficient. I want necessary and sufficient.

DNC Day 3 - The Other John

John Edwards speech is the only one I watched. Let me gettting out of my system, the guy is very gorgeous. The crowd loved him, the ovation he got, even before he started speaking was unbelievable. People just couldn't stop cheering.

His strategy was to present their "plan for America." Naturally when you do that, you risk losing your audience, and the pundit post-mortem likely to say, "boring, boring, boring." He wasn't boring, he was accessible without being condescending. He had to present a plan, or what seemed like one anyway, and he touched on several bread-and butter political issues: healthcare and medicare for everyone and especially the military and reservists (you had to know the Dubya stance to detect the so-called "digs" ), education, technology and research, tax credits, and jobs. He actually briefly got into how they plan to conduct handle these, which was the first time i was hearing it - except the education bit.

But I couldn't care less, John, just tell me you are not going do what Dubya is doing or, that you are going continue most Clintonian policies, then you had me at hello: smiling obsequiously absorbing the mass adulation, even before you started your address. Does John Edwards have to say anything, seriously?

DNC - Day 2 - Obama Rocks?

The verdict is unanimous, Obama Rocks. More Clintonesque than Clinton! I am sure somebody has said that already. Here's the speech, watch it here.

What is interesting, is the right-wing pundits are bent on painting the guy as a Republican. It’s almost as if, they want to say, "look we know he was a headliner for the Democrats in the most important election of their lives, but really give one or two things, he is one of us.” Some Einstein even suggested Obama could appear at the RNC in a month, say exactly the same things and still rock the crowd. My response: Really, that’s nice. Is that the best you can come out with?

They can’t criticize the guy in their usual, dichotomous and combative style. It will backfire – that’s how good this guy is! So, they decide to wishfully co-opt him into the Republican Party.

“See, everyone, the reason he is so good is because he is a closet Republican. In fact , if we pretend hard enough that he is a Republican, we will wake up on Aug 30th and he WILL be a Republican. Honest."

Yeah, right; and if I pray and pretend hard enough, I am going wake up next week and Anderson Cooper will declare his undying love for me! What? no, he likes good-looking boys too?

It's enough to make you want to scream!

PS. As Obama was talking I kept thinking he sounds like some prominent speaker I have heard before. It hit me, he pronounces his words like Ali - or at least like Will Smith playing Ali - with a clearer enunciation, and he doesn't talk that fast.

He is an Author and Professor. Oh, and he went to Harvard.

Hail to the King, Jon Stewart Blasts media at DNC

He told them, they are stage-managed or something to that effect. Haaaa! See USA Today

TIME's Photo Essay of the DNC

The scribes at Time magazine irritatingly write of Al Gore speech:

DREAMS OF RECOUNTS:
"In a funny, self-depreciating speech, Al Gore joked about his Florida loss and pressed the point that, in what will be a very tight election, every vote matters"

TIME.com: Democratic National Convention: Opening Night (4)

Self-depreciating, isn't that redundant? Depreciating always refers to a decline in value of the self or the entity. Depreciation inheres in the entity as it were, and that's why it's a bummer.

Self-deprecating is what this scribe means, surely. There was a time, I was tortured senseless to read this rag because the writing was good. What the fuck happened? Does nobody proof this shit anymore?

DNC Day 1: "Friends, Bostonians, Countrymen... I come to bury Dubya, not to praise him"

Hush, Bill hath speak.

Bill, You Scrumptuous Beaut!!!!


This is my brief impression on Tonight (Day 1) at Democratic National Convention:

Bill said a lot of things, first praising Kerry & Edwards, and then gradually started picking apart the Bush administration and it's track-record on foreign affairs (not just on Iraq, but remember Kyoto, The International Criminal Court, the nuclear non-proliferation treaty?) and on domestic policy. People have forgotten that shit, if at all they ever knew it. If you think Bush's performance has beeen awful re. foreign policy, well, his domestic policies have been worse. Is that even possible? Downright diabolical.

"Leave all the bloody children behind, see if they care; they can become President like me, I was C-student, left behind, hehehehehe"

"What environment, there's no scientific proof to back any of this environment stuff. Just evildoers making stuff up, putting fear in the American people. I make America safe."

"The Democrats are pussies on security, girlie-men, all of them. Have you seen how pretty that John Edwards looks? Girlie-man, supreme" - my favorite asinine assertion.

Tonight, Bill Clinton had this to say to the last one: "wisdom and strength are not conflicting values." Ouch, that hurts, you girlie-man, you!

Didn't catch all the speakers though. But both C-SPAN and the Dems are streaming the Convention live. interesting factoid: The Dem feed is better quality.

Saw Hillary Clinton too, she was fired up, less (insert preferred insult here) than usual, I thought. She slammed the Bushies for doing their darnest to prevent the 9/11 Commision from being formed in the first place, but she did so by praising the 9/11 victims' families for fighting hard to have the "non-partisan commision" constituted in the face of spirited opposition from the White House. Girl, we could learn some skills from you!

I missed Al Gore! A pity that, because last time out, the guy was like a possessed, Southern baptist priest, slamming the Administration, doing it like a previously pained and repressed man. He was like a man, who'd just come out, now carefree and relieved. Thouroughly entertaining. Have to read the transcript then? I doubt he was as fiery though tonight- apparently the Kerry Campaing is keeping to theme. Don't know what Jimmy Carter said either. Obviously one big strategy is to talk-up, John Kerry, because "nobody knows who the hell he is yet." Do people really need to know Kerry to make a decision here? Surely, if people understood Bush, if they knew or were reminded of all the shit he has cooked up since he took office, Kerry would be streets ahead in the polls. But our sleeping Watchdogs, a.k.a. The Fourth Estate -- god bless them, they are exhausted -- haven't done their job and it appears won't do it. So, my favorite president of all time remains credible.

So interestingly tonight, the other thing the speakers did do was just that, adumbrate the Bush policy foibles. Amen, long overdue. Clinton was most effective here:

In a Mark Antony-esque tempo alla "Friends, Romans, Countrymen" speech, he first gave you some fact about the Bush obscurantism, like: "Dubya hath robbed the sickly, and small children to give me, a now-wealthy swine, an excellent tax cut." He followed this up with, " but, if this seems right to you, then by all means, return the cretin to the White House, otherwise vote for John&John." He did this several times: "Dubya, like I, hath been a draft-dodger, was thing strong leadership? But, if you think this was right, then by all means vote for him, otherwise.... It worked for Mark Antony, and by god so Bill had the crowd on merry-fervored song.

Okay so he didn't exactly say that verbatim or the following, but I am sure he was wanted to, so I''ll say it: "Is this compasionate conservatism?" Yet (O'Reilly/ other clown) says Dubya is compassionate/strong." ----- I wonder if this was an intended, speech plan - on Bill's part - the Julius Ceasar connection, I mean. Mmmmmm Bill, sneaky. I'm probably just seeing/hearing things! Damn You, Will -eh, Shakespeare.

Finally, as a shameless Billanatic, I can't end without indulging in mindless gush: The guy is a SUPERSTAR. Seriously, he makes me want to be him, never mind pine for a leader like him. Screw that, I want to be him! And I am not even a guy. Oy, I don't know what that means.

Darfur: Is It Them or Us: Making the Islamist Shitlist

Are There a People, Who Have NOT Made the Islamists’ Shitlist?

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Jews, Westerners – read White, Africans – read Black, Hindi? Are there a people on planet earth left that have not made the Islamists/Muslim shitlist? Without going into merits/demerits of each case, that could take a while. Have Islamists had a beef with just about everyone on god’s earth? This is a gross generalization, I know. I could step more gingerly, but that takes too goddamn long. Right now, I am just pissed about the situation in Darfur. Of course, Muslim-inspired genocide against Africans and other general lynches and purges of the kind are nothing new historically. This whole thing though had me wondering, is there a people Muslims/Islamists are yet to fuck with? And, confession, I generally think the Palestinian people get a stinker for a deal.

Or is it that Black People have the curious distinction of making it to the shitlist of all institutionalized mass-murderers of the Zeitgeist?

Seriously, is there a people on planet earth that has NOT felt the need to generally fuck with Black people? We have been the whipping boys of every scum-faced belief system contrived by man. There better be a bloody god after all this. I want justice! And I want it now! Actually no, I don’t know about the now part. Fuck! Somebody do something about Darfur already!!!!!! Where is all that ‘shock-and-awe’ we have all come to love? Yes, you know the one. The one used against forces of evil, to liberate oppressed, tortured, peoples, and spread freedom and justice. Where is that damn crusader when you need him most?

Black Hole, Not So Hollow After all

This is a very funny-hilarious story. The BBC went with, Black holes turned 'inside out'.

So Stephen Hawking, today, dashes the hopes of science fiction lovers everywhere. What, there is no parallel universe? How can there be no parallel universe? All I have to say is, SUCKERS.

I have never quite got the fascination with science-fiction. I think Star Trek is about the only science-fictioney thing I ever followed: the one with William Shatner as (Captain Kirk?) & Leonard Nimoy as Mr Spock. And I am pretty sure it’s because captain Kirk was kinda dishy and TV generally sucked, choicewise. And, I consider myself somewhat amused by technology, gadgets, and science in general.

Confession: I have NOT seen a single one of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, not one. Everyone I know wants to loan me the DVDs. I’m like, why? Two of these goddamn things have been on cable for an eternity now, and I still have not bothered to watch. There is another sci-fi craze I am missing apparently……….Oh yeah, The Matrix. I saw the first one. Didn’t see the second. There’s a third installation? Haven’t seen that either. This probably has more to do with the fact that I am not a good consumer, rather than a specific and crazed aversion to sci-fi. I hate anything that is hyped. Bizarrely, I think to myself, if you have to advertise to me, it can’t be that good, can it? If you have to hype it, it must be downright useless! Advertising offends me as a means to motivate/excite me about anything in particular. [Oops, my little brother works in advertising: he pimps stuff to unsuspecting, good consumers – peace, bro :D. I still love you, see.]

This entry was supposed to be about the dashed hopes of sci-fi aficionados. Why am I writing about advertising? Oh, it must be that sci-fi aficionados have been had by the hype (and bad science). Fantastic! There was always something smug, a kind of smarter-than-thou shitface about sci-fi lovers. Pretentious bastards. Half the time, I wondered if these people understood this shit in the first place.

Anyway, I must commend Dr Hawking, as a scholar, for coming back and saying, “ooops, my bad - I was wrong, there is no parallel universe.” I hope he added, “what possessed me to think I had the (empirical) evidence to refute subatomic theory, I will never know.”

It’s a measure of a man or woman to say, I was wrong. Any other takers?

Did Martha Stewart Really Compare herself to Nelson Mandela?

Did she really? Or is she being picked on? Sometimes I get my "news" from late night. yes - shameful, but true. Did she really?

This whole Martha thing has been of little interest to me. I couldn't have cared less whether she was acquitted or convicted, until right now. It's one of those, let the law take its course..... yah dee yah. Who cares? Really. Until Right Now. To Mandela?

If she compared herself, her struggle to Nelson Mandela's struggles and was allowed to get away with it by whichever dunderhead was interviewwing her this time- I wash my hands of corporate US Media. There are clearly no bounds to this cacoethes for crap masquarading as journalism. Martha and Mandela: Two of a kind. I can see it. Totally.
I swear, fuck her, if that's what she said.

Today is Nelson Mandela and my Brother's Birthday

KG, Happy Birthday My Nigga. Love You Lots.


Madiba - WE LOVE YOU. Thanks for the inspirational voice.
The morally bereft cacophony would paralyze otherwise.

Happy 86th! May you have many, many more!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So Whoopi Called Bush a Cunt or Vagina?

I don’t really know which. From Jon Stewart’s monologue Thursday night, I gather the latter. It just got me thinking, it is revolutionary for a woman to call a man a cunt/vagina/punani. This is even better than black people re-appropriating the word nigger and using it as a term of endearment. Men being called bitches is nothing new in our urban, rap-painted pop culture. But, it is practically subversive for a man to be called a cunt/vagina by woman. It has been the sole prerogative of the male species to hurl the ultimate insult, you cunt. And if that’s not enough, they would even call on your mamma’s punani, just for good measure. There’s been no retort for this assault: you penis/ you dick, just do not reverberate as well.

So it is with unimagined relief to hear what Ms. Goldberg said (or did not say). Since I don’t know what she said precisely, for convenience I am going to assume she said cunt. It serves my purposes, and it turns a decidedly bad situation (self-censorship) into a positively empowering one.

I want to congratulate Ms. Goldberg for boldly going where no woman (or man?) has gone before, call a man a big fat cunt. From now onwards, men can expect us to call them just that where warranted. Forget the fallout with Unilever/Slim-Fast (by the way, I too am boycotting their products and telling my friends to do the same) and there’s no love lost with Bush anyway, this is the beginning of the re-appropriation of that word. As with all vocab re-appropriations, there will be naysayers from now till eternity. After all, Bill Cosby still has his knickers in a knot about my nigga. My Nigga, relax.

To all those people who ever called me a cunt though, you cunt right back at ya!

PS. Bush’s face personally reminds me of a wrinkled bottom, but I’ll take cunt since you brought it up.