why don't people just see that republicans are crazy?

Sayeth Donald Rumsfeld: We need to militarize space to prevent a "space Pearl Harbor." I kid you not, the stupid fucking Republicans want to launch missle firing satellites into space, according to ABC News. I thought we were at war with terrorism, does al Qaeda having fucking spaceships now?

..."anything to blow shit up" that should be George Bush's official campaign slogan.

*******

A recent National Republican Congressional Committee survey asked the question "Should America broaden the war on terrorism into other countries that harbor and aid terrorists such as Thailand, Syria, Somalia, the Philippines, etc.?". Thailand and the Philipines (who are with us, not against us as the dichotomy goes), are rightfully pissed and confused. Just what our foriegn image needs is our allies asking WTF?

*******

If it weren't for the fact that he's Cambodian, this guy would probably be a Republican too. He's crazy enough at least.

the little things

It's always the stupid little things that make my heart grab onto another person. It's weird. I can work with someone, care about someone, befriend someone, even love someone and never really really feel for them until a certain moment comes to pass and almost always that certain moment entails seeing some stupid little thing that they find dear...something stupid and little that seperates them from everyone else.

I don't mean to be cryptic here, but I don't want to be too specific either. Suffice to say, there are people in my life that have wedged themselves deeper into my heart lately because I've witnessed some act, or seen some object that they possess, or heard them relay an act that was just so entirely personal...

Today I saw something that a friend had bought and it gave me the chills. It was just a stupid thing, bought here or there, but it was something that nobody I know but her would buy. In fact, nobody in her position in life would probably buy it and it just spoke volumes to me about the purity of her heart and inner beauty that radiates so brightly from her. An inner beauty that blinds me sometimes. When I saw it, it practically brought me to tears. I'm practically in tears reliving the moment in writing this. It was just so fucking beautiful...not in any aesthetic way...just in a plastic bag in the wind sorta way. An American Beauty sort of moment...one of those moments where there's just so much beauty that you just don't think your heart can take it anymore.

I don't tell people when I have these moments concerning them though, I feel way too self-conscious, as if it's unnaturally dorky or somehow unsettling...besides, I always fear that those for whom I have these feelings wouldn't believe me if I told them anyway...I'm not sure I'd believe someone if they told me they saw me radiating inner beauty or some such junk. It's the truth though.

and the ass wiping continues

I miss the good old days when there wa a Bill of Rights that protected our rights from possible corruption of overzealous governments. Heck, I miss the days when the purpose of the Constitution was to re-iterate rights that common sense would consider natural rights like the right to speak ones mind and to vote and stuff...not take them away like getting married and stuff. In any case, I don't want to open a bigger can of worms than is necessary...and no bigger can is necessary on this one:

Exit stage right...the Fourth Amendment...

It's a groundbreaking court decision that legal experts say will affect everyone: Police officers in Louisiana no longer need a search or arrest warrant to conduct a brief search of your home or business.

Leaders in law enforcement say it will provide safety to officers, but others argue it's a privilege that could be abused.

The decision was made by the New Orleans-based 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. Two dissenting judges called it the "road to Hell."

source

Not that this won't get overturned (I hope) in higher-up courts, but just the thought that there are judges out there that would agree to these...like the few that agree to the unconstitutional treatment of "foriegn combatents" or whatever we're calling them...makes me want to die. This has been a no-brainer throughout the first 225 years of this nation's Constitutional history, but now it's all fizzling. We are in the first days of the end my friends.

our funny, funny president

Every year the President of the United States attends the Radio and Television News Correspondents Association dinner and makes fun of himself. It's light fare, and a roast of sorts of the president. But this year, George Bush took it too far.

The other night he had a slide show of goofy pictures to which he added his personal commentary. Halfway through the batch, there was at least one slide of him looking under a desk to which he quipped, "Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere ... nope, no weapons over there ... maybe under here?"

Cute. Oh so cute Mr. President.

First you trump up the "evidence" of the existence of weapons of mass destructions, then you trump up charges of their emminent danger to American safety, then you send over the troops without adequate support and numbers in search of those WMDs, then hundreds die (591 as of now) in that search, then they're given up on more or less making all of it (the deaths of 591 Americans, 9-11,000 innocent Iraqi citizens, the destruction of the Iraqi infrastructure, and the needless antagonization of the entire Muslim world) a tragedy and then you feel it at all appropriate to make a cutesy ass little joke about it? Fuck you.

You know, the Republican attack machine is out in full force on this one defending this "joke" as being part of the regular procedings...but I don't remember Clinton going out there and mocking those that died during the "Black Hawk Down" tragedy in Mogadishu or for that matter, Nixon, Johnson, Truman, Roosevelt, or any president during wartime (or "war" time as the case may be) openly being so callous about the human tragedy that is war. It's made worse by the fact that Bush has showed so little concern for the common fighting man and woman...having not yet attended the funeral of any of those lost in fighting, having not publically acknowledged any particular deaths or stories of hardship, having forbade the full reporting of individual deaths (by preventing the photography of caskits coming off the planes in Dover), and even having stripped away some of our soldiers' benefits. Most importantly, it's made most intolerable by Bush's lack of apology for having made a bad decision based on bad intelligence...throwing us into a war of choice having made the case so adamently that it was a war of necessity. This is despicable, and it's despicable that the entire Republican machine is out defending this.

celebrate national cliched oxymoron day

Giant Shrimp!

from Long John Silver's website:

NASA's March 23 announcement of evidence of the past presence of "a body of gently flowing saltwater" on Mars is big news for America, and giant news for seafood fans.

In January, Long John Silver's offered to give America free Giant Shrimp if NASA found conclusive evidence of an ocean on Mars. To celebrate the success of NASA's Mars Rover project, the company is going to give America free Giant Shrimp on Monday, May 10.

"This is the big announcement that Long John Silver's has been waiting for since January - that there is evidence of a past salty sea on Mars," said Mike Baker, Chief Marketing Officer for Long John Silver's, Inc. "We can't wait to celebrate NASA's out-of-this-world success, and there's no better way to recognize their giant accomplishments than with free Giant Shrimp for America."

On Monday, May 10, between the hours of 2 p.m. and 5 p.m., customers can stop by any participating Long John Silver's
restaurant and enjoy a free Giant Shrimp (one piece per customer).

just do it

Top doc backs picking your nose and eating it

latin for dummies

I'm being a complete and total politico geek and listening/watching the news while re-organizing and cleaning my bedroom and this Dick Clark character's criticism of the Bush Whitehouse. I am in awe of the Bush administration's reponse. Mr. Clark comes out with these allegations that Bushco tried to persuade Clark and his ilk to "find" information relating Iraq to the 9/11 attacks because, as Rumsfeld stated, there aren't any good targets in Afghanistan but there are plenty of them in Iraq.

These are really bad allegations, they are things that need to be addressed, if they are untrue, the administration should be going out and saying, "look, this guy is wrong". They are, with a few facts. They are going on the news and arguing that there's no record of Rusfeld saying this or Cheney saying that, but that's about it. The allegations, as a conspiracy of sorts, they are not denying.

There response, instead, is to attack Mr. Clark. For hours now I have seen a steady stream of Bush officials being interviewed complaining that Clark's publication of his book timed to his testimony before the 9/11 invetigation is lacking taste and that all sorts of bad things happened under his watch (the African embassy bombings, the USS Cole attack, et al). That's what they got, that and some other, what the Romans called, ad hominem attacks. In logic that sort of thing is considered a fallacy...and in politics that sort of thing is called a admission of guilt.

flirting

You know, I'm actually pretty good with the whole flirting thing when I don't have a chance in hell of it getting me anywhere or when I'm not at all interested...it's when I actually like the girl or have a shot with her that my flirting takes on characteristics of a full body dry heeve (to steal a description from Seinfeld). I guess I've noticed that before, but I was just about to say something really flirty to someone on a discussion board I frequent and that fact smacked me in the face.

It'd be funny if it didn't lead to my perpetual singledom.

goodness

I rode my bike home from work on Friday. It wasn't a tremendous bikeride, but still 8 miles or so in around 45 minutes (plus a stop at the store in there) so it was still good. Especially considering it was only the third day I've had my bike on the road this year so my legs (well, and all the muscles used for bike riding) are still sorta out of it. It felt great though.

I hadn't planned on doing it either...I had gotten out of work fifteen minutes early and decided that I didn't want to wait the 20-25 minutes for the bus, I figured I'd bike the bus route and hop on whenever it caught up to me. It didn't. Ha. Anyway, I'm writing this because I've been finding myself looking outside and watching the weather report trying to figure out when I can do it again. Wind and cold and rain are kind of putting a damper on it until Wednesday or so, but I'm geeked.

...so much for being a lazy ass like I have been since I was a kid. Maybe this year the "get rid of my spare tire" resolution will actually come to pass. Heck, if I can put ten miles or more on my bike tires I figure I can eat about as much of anything that I want and still melt some of the fat off. SWEET. Feeling motivated for the first time in a long time feels wonderful.

the people on the bus go blah blah blech

Ugh. It was a wonderful day outside today. For the springtime. At least compared to how this winter's been. It was sunny, a slight breeze, and felt around 50. Very, very nice. Because of this, I was pretty alright with the fact that I misread the bus schedule, confusing the weekday chart to today's schedule, and got to the stop a full fifteen minutes early...I decided to walk up the route a bit. 'Twas swell.

After the bus caught up and I rode to the grocery store, did my shopping, and left to the bus stop to wait yet again (no walking while waiting, having ten pounds of potatoes plus another twenty-five pounds of assorted crap on my back along with another bag in my hand made me lazy). I sat there for ten minutes, making phone calls I had to make and whatnot but was happy when I was joined by another bus person.

"How's it going?" I ask.

"They're selling girl scout cookies in the mall," he tells me, having not answered my question, and making me wonder about his mental facalties. "What's your favorite kind?" He adds in a sort of childish tone, affirming my suspicions.

"I guess I'd have to say the mint ones." I tell him...even though it's a very definite for certain that they really are my favorites.

"I like the shortbread ones."

"That's nice." I should have said swell. That was a "swell" kind of moment.

"It reminds me of this book I read once...it was about a boy named Benji who lived with his Uncle in a Lighthouse. They had a bell there and it was big..." I looked at my phone to get the time, "...but one night Benji was trying to sleep and all he could here was the storm, he couldn't hear the bell..." I look up the street, hoping and praying that the damn bus would come, "...so they had to go up there and Benji's uncle asked him to hold the flashlight so he could see what was wrong with the bell... blah blah blah blah"

This whole time I'm nodding away, not paying too much attention, not really giving a rat's ass about Benji, his stupid-ass uncle and the bell in their lighthouse. I'm trying to drop him hints as such, looking around, frantically searching for the bus, checking the time every thirty seconds or so, but he's not getting it...he's so not getting it, in fact, that his storytelling goes interactive as he starts asking me questions about what will happen next in his story: "Do you think they'll figure out what's wrong with the bell?" "Do you think they'll be able to fix it?" He even starts doing impressions of Benji as he gets to the part where they fix the bell (yay!...though it seemed oh so likely that they would from the beginning) and it goes, in his word, "BONG!" and he throws his head back over and over and over again as I even more frantically and desperately search around for the bus or a stranded car with keys in the ignition and the engine running or even some sort of wandering horse or whatever. I'm just about ready to fall down on my knees and ask, no, beg, God for mercy in getting me out of this terribly akward and embarrassing position when the bus comes round the bend. See, there is a God.

Ugh. I can't stand being in that position. I'm too damn nice to say "please shut the fuck up" but at the same time I really don't care enough about strangers' needs to talk to really want to listen. It distresses me. Ugh. It's most definitely a spot in between a rock and a hard place...and it happens all the time on the bus. Last week (or the week before), one guy was telling me about his green notebook that he writes his plas of going to Florida in. He kept telling me it was a green notebook, he kept telling me he had an 8 by 12 trailer down there for himself. He told me these things about a thousand times. I was about to go beserk when he decided my company wasn't good enough for him or something and he moved...mid story. Man.

You know, I feel sort of bad...like I'm intolerant of those with mental disabilities. I almost feel rotten posting this. It's not that I find them less worthy of my attention or that I respect them less than I do others or anything like that...it's just they make me uncomfortable I think. I don't know why that is. It's definitely uncomfortable though. Anyway...

matt drudge is a wanker

On the Drudge Report right now is a "news flash" entitled "SPRING BREAK: KERRY RETREATS TO HIS SUN VALLEY MANSION FOR 5-DAY LUXURY UNWIND..." which basically goes into detail how Kerry is planning to take a 5-day break at his Idaho mansion which is "Gorgeous, 19.5 rooms at 7,749 square-feet, with a market value of $4.9 million [property taxes of more than $30,000 annually], Kerry's Idaho vacation getaway will be the setting of a Spring Break regroup and unwind, sources tell the DRUDGE REPORT."

Obviously, this is an attempt to somehow discredit John Kerry and as such just goes to show how sad the Republicans are going this year in campaigning. Seriously, maybe it wouldn't be so insanely pathetic if it weren't for the fact that their candidate has a Texas ranch, a family compound in Kennebunkport and business dealings all over the globe. In fact, I would venture to guess that Bush is worth more than John Kerry as much of John Kerry's wealth is actually his wife's...money that has nickle and dimed it's way into her family's bank accounts with every glob of catsup spanked out of a Heinz bottle. In any case, I just think it's sad.

What is happening to this country?

on the defensive

So I guess Karl Rove, the so-called political genius, has come right out and stated that Bush's re-election campaign is a defensive one. According to This article the Bush camp "has material ready to go on Kerry based on his votes and speeches" which is really pretty sad. No, not pretty sad. Really, really, pathetically depressing. An incumbant president does not run an attack campaign, it's just not right. In fact, not attacking has a name: the "Rose Garden Strategy". But his break from that norm is an admission that the first term was more or less a failure and that there's really nothing to stand up and defend. Attack the other guy.

It's especially pathetic when the candidate doing it has always tried to depict himself as an honorable man, someone that has unquestionable character, someone who is anything like Clinton. Clinton, however, did not attack Bob Dole by name until July of 1996, Bushy's daddy didn't mention Bill Clinton's name in an attack until August of 1992, and Ronald Reagan didn't attack Wlater Mondale by name until October of 1984. Each of these other men had balls to stand up and defend their record, make themselves out to be truly presidential, have honor. Dubya has no such honor.

It just makes the whole system -- government, politics, the whole shebang -- just that much more weak and fucked up. Not only do we have a president that is eroding civil liberties and destroying our fragile foriegn alliances around the globe, but he is ripping to shreads what little dignity is left in the office of the President of the United States after what certain other presidents have done (and yes, I am including Clinton in that too in case any rabid Republican attack dog thugs google this blog or something). For shame, for shame.

God Bless King George!

growing some gonads

I know this is pretty much ridiculous to find any but the smallest iota of pride in, but I confronted my roommate today about his smoking in the apartment. It's been bothering me for months as he started doing it excessively when it got cold out. And when I gave up my little habit of smoking socially (and often times not) the smell became both disgusting and rather tempting and otherwise making my life way worse off than the benefits of having a roommate could make up for.

In any case, this has been a source of growing hatred towards my roommate for months now and I've been trying to confront him about it but kept making the excuse that I didn't just want to say something "out of the blue" and would instead wait until I could catch him. Unfortunately, he's not home during regular human hours and when he is it's pretty much going in and out...coming in to blast the TV while he eats his Taco Bell dinner dujour and/or taking his shower before he goes off to find meaning for living with his girlfriend, working, or drinking half his monthly income away (so that he can ask me and/or his parents for money when the bills are due). Well, I had a really nice long talk with a friend yesterday and among the things we talked about was my dilemma and she told me not to worry about it...so I decided I wouldn't and that I'd say something today, no matter what.

Well today he smoked while I was awake and didn't split as soon as he was done (that's right, he'll smoke in his bedroom and then leave the apartment immediately afterward -- which, of course, begs the question of why he can't just smoke while outside but then, he's retarded or something so it's not really worth asking) so I had the time to go out to the living room and ask him to not smoke in his bedroom because the smoke goes right through the heating vents into my room. His response: no apology, no plea of ignorance to the non-airtightness of his bedroom, no nothing, just an "ok".

What a fuck-face he is.

In any case, I confronted the guy and that makes me happy. He better fucking heed my request too since it's my name and my name alone on the lease and none of his friends have extra bedrooms, if you catch my drift. Now that I've brought it up, I won't have my timidity to prevent me from bringing it up again if the issue arises. It took him months to work his way up to strike one, but strikes two and three are one-time things.

I swear that's the way it'll be (unless I decided to wait in kicking him out for selfish rent-sharing purposes having not found a roommate to replace him). I'm like that...I'll let something bother me to the point of blood-pressure issues and then after I say something the first time not have a problem with bringing it up again. How weird is that? Then again, that's pretty much a guy thing isn't it?

Oh well, at least my balls dropped today when it came to this little issue. That's a good thing.

interesting

I think it's safe to say that I'm too much into Googling to see what it takes to have my webspaces come up, but I just googled "unenjoyment" to find out in the brief google-description that the domain expired last November and that I just happened to luck out in getting it. I find that interesting. It's also interesting that as such, typing the word "unenjoyment" leads to my new site being the first out of 246.

Another interesting find:

This blog is number 1 out of 522 for "beliefs of preppies"

a busy day

I have spent most of today online, or at least working on things that will eventually go online and for whatever reason, doing so has allowed me a lot of time to think and reflect. I don't know.

I've noticed myself being a wee bit overconfident lately. That in itself isn't such a bad thing, but in my case it generally leads to me not appreciating what I have. I become too easily complacent, too accustoed to the good stuff and instead of just sitting back and being happy with what I do have...I complain that I'm not getting more. It's the part of me that's so apt to addiction leering it's ugly head.

The fact of the matter is, things are going well... I have a job now that pays as me more every two weeks than I've become accustomed to living off of every month for the past half year. I have my health aside for this indigestion thing that runs in my family cropping up suddenly in the past few weeks. I have friends that are like family to me and family that loves me dearly. I have a plan for my future in terms of schooling and a job and everything there is keeping itself on track. I mean, I should be happy. But I complain.

It's those things that I don't have and I so desperately want...to be free of debt, the success in my endeavors that I've expected for myself since I was a child, and a girl that loves me and wants to be with me the rest of her life. But even those things have their prospects right now, for the most part. I know those things take time...but I mock them all because they're not already right here in front of me. I don't know why.

I get too easily frustrated with the wait and I don't understand that because I am generally a very patient and calm person. Maybe it's because those thigns are out of my control. Maybe it's because there's enough doubt that I can't have total faith in them. Maybe I mock them because I want to leave a bit of breathing room in case I fail.

Maybe it's not overconfidence at all, but insecurity.

That's it though, I don't want to be insecure anymore. I have slain so many of my demons over the past year and a half but that one still stands up and fights me. Like Hercules' Hydra I keep chopping off heads only to find others pop up to come back for me to destroy. *sigh*

But I allow this battle to interfere with everything else, to get in the way of seeing the beauty of life and the happiness that I should be enjoying. I let it lead me to dismissal of possibilities. No more.

I know I've gone into this so many times so many times before, but this time I am actually trying to be honest with myself rather than seeking out pity of those of you out there in the world that read this blog. I think that's in large part why I do all this whining...to have people say "it's alright" as if that'll erase the insecurities. Well, not this time. This is my statement that I am no longer in denial, that I am openly in a life or death struggle with my own insecurities and I ask for no pity, sympathy, or reassurance from anyone. I don't need it, I don't want it anymore. I want to be free of this and I want to be able to appreciate what I do have and allow my yearnings for the future remain nothing more than yearnings...not obsessions.

experimentation

I'm working on moving everything around behind the viel of the pques.net URL so that I can add on new pages with different URLs and blahty blahty blah. In any case, anyone trying to access my pages (aside from this blog) might have problems as I get it done (hopefully) by the end of the day today. Hopefully. ehehehe.

...watch me completely lose everything...

the sentimental old bastard

I think most of us keep little knick-knacks to remind us of our past. I remember when my grandma died, I took a single stone from the front of her house and to this day keep it with a picture of me and her, as well as a small bell she had to commemerate my birth. I also have a small matchbox from a girl I was once in love with...a "gift" from her in a playful moment of handing off some useless garbage. And I don't think I could even begin to list the boxes of stuff I have of my moms...

It's human nature.

But what does Donald Rumsfeld keep on his desk? A piece of one of the 9/11 planes. How precious, how sick, how nearly feloneous.

As it turns out, there's a lot of stuff out there that federal agents and the like kept after the attacks...as macabre souveniours of that most awful of days. Seems sort of sick to me, especially when it's someone as powerful as the Secretary of Defense. I could see a lowly cop keeping a stray patch off a fallen compatriot's sleeve or something...but for someone of Rumsfeld's stature? For shame.

...especially when I remember comments made by members of the administration when pieces of wreckage found their way onto eBay and the like....

I'm gonna hold back dropping the H-bomb this time around. I think we all know the administration is full of it by now.

new website and enemployment update

Well, my unemployment woes have moved me into a rage. The other day I received a letter saying that I was delinquent in paying them back all that I had gotten and when I called to inquire on it found out that they never received my protest to the redetermination made against me...in short, they're fucking me over and threatening legal action to get their precious $3200 back.

I'm pissed.

As such, I am using the extended weekend that I have been blessed with to launch a campaign to screw over all parties that are trying to screw me over. I am writing the Govenor of Michigan, my State Rep and State Senator, a couple media outlets including the local paper and television stations telling them all my story in an attempt to get some help -- legally or financially -- and maybe embarrass some worthless mother-fuckers at the unemployment agency out of work...maybe get them fired. I'm writing Papa Johns and letting them know how their franchisees treat their employees and let them know that I'm telling a lot of people my story (or at least enough to cost them more losses in business than in unemployment). I'm also launching a website to spread the word, make this an issue, raise public awareness, and, in the likely chance that I will eventually have to give them their money back, panhandle. I don't know what the site will be called as of now, but I just registered the URL unenjoyment.com (which is a play on words a friend of mine introduced me to) which may very well be the place, otherwise some sort of statement along the lines of "unemployment sucks" (though unemploymentsucks.com is taken by some asshole cyber-squatter) -- any suggestions will be gladly taken though.

an open letter to the female gender

I was talking with a girl at work the other day and it occurred to me that a lot of girls need to hear something...a guy doesn't need to be drooling all over you, pawing you, trying to get into your pants to think your gorgeous. And he doesn't need to think you're gorgeous to think that you are the single greatest thing that's ever been. Hell, I've been in love before without showing any symptom outwardly...at least that I was aware of. I have lusted over many girls that had no clue.

It's just that I get this feeling sometimes that an awful lot of girls think that they are less than woderful unless there are guys "being guys" towards them. I say "being guys" because I think it's all in the stereotype -- that we're horny devils that nothing can control....that guys can't control their hormones...that we're driven entirely by the desire to place our penises in warm, moist holes...that none of us can have any tact when desire hits them -- that they lose all self control of mind, mouth, and hands.

B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T

Fuck that. That's all nonsense. Though there is the vast majority that could very well be classified in that way, there are plenty of us out there that are capable of tremendous amounts of lust and love without losing control...I gotta raise my hand there. I know I'm not alone either. I don't know -- there's something involved there that I think is the basis of the whole "nice guys lose" fact of life. That girls not only don't realize just how much we like 'em if we don't go all apeshit...but feel that the absence of said behavior negates the existence of said emotions.

That just ain't so.

the results of wiping one's ass with the bill of rights

As has been the case for the past week or so, John Ashcroft is in the hospital suffering a very painful case of gallstones or pancreitis or some combination thereof...and for the past week I have felt a small bit of karmic restitution in that the guy is suffering severe pain with a serious, and sometimes fatal, infliction. I mean, if anyone deserves to be in such horrible pain (and no one truly "deserves" to be in pain...but you know what I mean) it's America's favorite jack-booted thug™.

I wasnt going to mention the story because of the fact that it's mean to think such bad thoughts and to find at least a little joy in even the worst of man's suffering...but then Ms. Michelle Malkin posted this on Townhall. For those that don't want to infect their computers with a rancid Townhall cookie:

It is not the incivility of the Ashcroft-haters that galls me. It is the unmitigated insipidity and apathy they display toward what this man and his department have done to protect their right to be free, safe and stupid.

I would just like to point out to Ms. Malkin that many bad, bad men did very, very good things for their countries. Hitler built a superb expressway system linking every corner of Germany, Lenin and Stalin industrialized the serfdom that was Tsarist Russia, Saddam Hussein brought the greatest women's rights of the Middle East to Iraq, Castro trains excellent doctors for cheap, and the list could go on and on and on...

Ms. Malkin points out that those that would criticize John Ashcroft's methods "don't get it" in much the same way as trench-coated losers argue that Matrix-haters only hate the sequels because they too, "don't get it". Oh yeah, Ms. Malkin, we get it. Yes, John Ashcroft has jack-booted his way to putting away some very bad men...bravo, bravo. But we also get that it isn't that hard to catch the baddies when you throw a net over the entire fucking country. Skill in justice, as in medicine, comes in precision...the removal of bad elements without causing distress to the body as a whole.

John Ashcroft should be lauded for his successes only in so much as his doctors should have been lauded had they removed his gall bladder by messily reaching their hands through his ribcage and yanking it out with one quick jerk. Instead, Im sure they performed their surgery with precision becoming a doctor in these United States of America...living up to a certain ethical, moral, and professional code...something we can only hope for in an Attorney General.

sleep

So I went to bed at about quarter to ten because I was dead tired (waking up at 6:30 is not good for me, especially on Mondays) and fell instantly asleep. But then my phone rings at 11, my dad calling to tell me that he had gotten a phone call from a bank for e earlier. WHY?!?!?! Seriously, not that I'm mad at my dad or anything, but it seems that anytime I try to go to bed at a decent hour (before 11) someone calls me. It's as if I do it and suddenly a beacon goes out that Kyle must be called....

...and we all know that I don't get called when I'm not trying to sleep. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr....

So anyway, that was an hour ago and now I am fully awake again, hoping and praying that I am going to be able to get to sleep before one or two or else tomorrow is going to be a livng hell for me. I just have to have one of those sleeping dealies where I can't get back to sleep once I'm woken up. Fucking-a.

Note to self: turn off your phone whenever you try to go to sleep before midnight.

you know you're getting older when...

I know I haven't posted much personal crap here (or much of anything) for the past couple weeks and like I said before, it's because I got a lot going through my head...weird stuff. No, not weird, just "different" stuff. Stuff that sort of freaks me out, stuff that makes me uncomfortable. Stuff that's, in a way I guess, embarrassing...not because it's embarassing, but because of what it means...that I'm getting old. Blech.

I've been fantasizing a lot lately. Not about the stuff I once fantasized about either...backpacking around the world, three-ways with super-models, being rich and powerful and that sort of thing. Not that stuff at all. Geez, I can't even bloody type this out...

Well, frankly I've been fantasizing about being a father. I know that's dorky and uncool or whatever, but I honestly have. To have a son that I can teach to throw a curve ball to (after I frantically try to learn how to throw a curve ball first), a daughter that I can have on my knee and tell stories about princesses in far off lands. That's what I want. That's all. I want so much to settle down and have a family and be responsible and all that stuff. I want to get a house and a dog and a minivan (though some sort of hybrid minivan of course...not that I think there's one on the market). I want a steady job. I want all that stuff. Ugh.

It scares me. It really, really scares me. I'm not supposed to be that guy, that guy's not supposed to peek his head into my life until I'm old...but I guess it means that I am.

Anyway, I guess that this sort of line of thought is why I've been sort of grumpy and ungiving on this here blog lately. It's something that I'm coming to grips with and I just can't help but think that it's introducing itself into my life a little early...before girls my age are really ready to drop the "bad-boys are dreamy" schtick and realize that I'm prime baby. Prime.

Oh well...I'm not going to go down that road tonight. :)

four legs good, two legs better

So, since the beginning of the Second Gulf War, President Bush has denied the press the right to film the caskets of dead soldiers as they come off the planes in Dover. It has been claimed to be for the respect and privacy of the soldiers and their families, a worthy claim, I suppose. I mean, I guess if I wouldn't have wanted the casket of my mother shown on television or in the papers knowing that some would use it as a political chess piece of some sort...

...like what Bush is now doing with the victims of the terrorist bombings of 2001.

Bush's candidacy was kicked off yesterday with an ad campaign that claims inherited recessions and burst stock bubbles and the like and claims grand leadership from der fuhrer..ehem, I mean Bush in handling those problems...and then screams what will most likely become the single issue of a single issue candidacy...

The screen shows the rubble of the Trade towers, shows the casket of a fallen firefighter and claims the wonderment that is George W. Bush and uses these images to suggest his great leadership.

...leadership that's based on exploitation of national tragedy, a limelight that could have shown just as brightly on anyone else, reactionary jingoism in the third degree. Leadership that is seemingly only visible when national tragedy is invoked, which I would argue is not even leadership at all. All the while resting on the use of images to prop himself up that he dare not allow others to use to discredit him.

Hypocrisy at its finest.

God Bless King George.

too much passion

So I'm not really holding in my feelings about The Passion of Christ and how the uber-violence of the movie pisses me off and all that stuff I wrote about the other night. Problem is, people's responses piss me off anymore.

Today, having found myself in a circle of people discussing the movie at work. I mentioned how impossible it was that Jesus, who was after all fully human, could have taken even a quarter of the beating that he does in the mvie. I was told that maybe I believed but didn't have faith and that's why I have a hard time with the movie. I shocked myself...and walked away with a smile when all I was doing inside was wanting to tell the fucker to go to hell and then do one thing or another to expedite his journey there. I hate that holier-than-thou shit. I hate it. HATE HATE HATE it. It's why I don't go to church after all, the reason that I hate my uber-"christian" alma mater and all the sanctimonious mother-fuckers that make up 98% of the alumni too for that matter. I was told once in college that I wasn't christian because I didn't go to church on weekend. I wanted to beat the living shit out of the guy that said that too.

But I've strayed from the point....

The point that I want to make about the movie is that it's overly violent. Considering it's about a guy who taught about peace and love and aimed at an audience that abhors violence (and naughty words and bits -- but those aren't a factor here) in the movies these days I think it's rather self-defeating. I mean, so many people come out of it remembering the scourging and the bloodiness more than anything else that it detracts from the real discussion. Roger Ebert called it the most violent movie he ever saw and, considering he's seen most evey movie ever made I'm sure, that's saying a lot.

Why are people so apt to defend something as being "the way it was" (as the Pope reportedly said) when so many people coming out of it remember little else than the violence? "But it's supposed to show the suffering that Christ went through" people might say...but what happens when the vioence is so outrageously over the top that it's not even real? What good does that do? I remember coming out of Kill Bill and thinking just how funny that movie was -- even though it too was extremely violent -- because of how over-the-top the violence was. That was my impression here too. Not to the same extent though, at least with Kill Bill it was purposefully over-the-top, cartoonishly over-the-top..in either case, it's not believable.

I don't know, it just really bothers me because the religious community has embraced this movie a little too tightly in my mind. If it is the case that maybe I don't have enough faith, that I'm just ignorant and maybe Jesus was not just human, but superhuman in His abilities to have His ass kicked so thouroughly for so long and still be able to walk (and for a short time burdan His own cross). Maybe that's what I gotta believe in to find the awe-inspiration that so many talk about...but I don't wanna. You know, I watched The Last Temptation of Christ a week ago, just because it received the same amount of hype as Gibson's Christ -- though in that case it was conservative Christians protesting against the movie -- and I jsut don't see why one is so evil and the other so good. Last Temptation's great sin, I guess, was that it delved too deeply into the humanness of Christ and protrayed Him as a sort of reluctant savior...whereas Passion seems to err on the opposite side of that coin, dwelling in the superhuman, Timex-like, abilities of Christ to endure tremendous amounts of pain, abuse, and loss of blood.

Personally, I would like to see a movie that explores Christ as a Human Being annointed by God as He was to be as God, protraying both sides of His holy being without the controversy of exageration or subjectivity of the filmmaker trying to make some sort of statement. Then again, that ain't never gonna happen...since all movies in the end are made by people and people aren't able to objectify their art like that. hmph.