Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit Discussion

A few days ago, someone came on here and left a diary consisting of nothing more than a piece of hokey poetry sent around as a chain email. The message was one designed to elicit unconditional support for soldiers sent over to other countries to fight and kill people.

It bothered me to think that, for many Americans, the preferred method of dealing with foreigners seems to be to invade their countries and kill them. American xenophobia isn’t expressed just in terms of war, but also in terms of this year’s push to make English the only official language of the United States – as if there is something inherently menacing in a foreign language.

I thought back to a song that I heard a long time ago, performed back in 1991 by Raffi to a crowd of children. Remember 1991, when people had hope for the world, and there was the promise of the Peace Dividend to deliver us from the Republicans’ debts?

Well, this song was pretty simple, consisting of the simple declaration of the names of children from different countries. The point was simple too – human beings from different cultures and countries have the fundamental things in common, and we ought to try to understand each other instead of being afraid of our mutual foreign identities. It’s a simple message that has, sadly, largely been lost.

I’d like to hear a lot more of this song. Here are the lyrics:

Janet lives in England
Pierre lives in France
Bonnie lives in Canada
Ahmed lives in Egypt
Moshe lives in Israel
Bruce lives in Australia

Ching lives in China
Olga lives in Russia
Ingrid lives in Germany
Gita lives in India
Pablo lives in Spain
Jose lives in Columbia.

And each one is much like another
A child of a mother and a father
A very special son or daughter
A lot like me and you.

Koji lives in Japan
Nina lives in Chile
Farida lives in Pakistan
Zocha lives in Poland
Manuel lives in Brazil
Maria lives in Italy.

Kofi lives in Ghana
Rahim lives in Iran
Rosa lives in Paraguay
Najee lives in Kenya
Dimitri lives in Greece
Sue lives in America.

And each one is much like another
A child of a mother and a father
A very special son or daughter
A lot like me and you.

So, the New York Times has endorsed Ned Lamont, rejecting Joseph Lieberman’s term in Senate one “in which the never-ending war on terror becomes an excuse for silence and inaction”. Swell.

What does this mean? Mainstream pundits are viewing it as a devastating blow to Lieberman’s re-election campaign. But does that mean that we’re supposed to believe that Lieberman’s campaign was doing well until the big newspaper’s endorsement of Lamont?

Washington D.C. pundits just can’t imagine that Connecticut voters might have been making conclusions about Joseph Lieberman’s right wing politics on their own, but that’s just what has been happening. Lieberman has been a stain on the Democratic Party for years, long before the Iraq War was begun. Starting with Lieberman’s preaching condemnation of Bill Clinton’s personal life, and extending through the drag of his religious preoccupations on Al Gore’s 2000 presidential campaign, many of the Democratic Party’s most devastating defeats have been due in large part to Lieberman’s insistence in promoting a narrow, restrictive vision of what it means to be an American.

It’s good that the New York Times is finally joining grassroots Democrats in their rejection of Joseph Lieberman. However, it’s not the editorial of the Times that will have sunk Lieberman’s career. Senator Lieberman managed to do that all on his own.

You know, when I first heard that Mel Gibson had said, while being arrested recently in California, some “offensive things,” I was really really worried. I thought maybe the star of Lethal Action had said “Stem cell research is not such a bad thing” or “Gay? OK!” or “F**k, but those Buddhists really have a point there.” That would have been a level of career-destroying offensiveness, for sure.

But then I read the actual police report of Mel Gibson’s remarks while being arrested for driving after drinking the communion wine (what’s wrong with that? nothing but being RELIGIOUS!). Here’s all the nicest guy in Hollywood ever said:

“My Life Is Fucked” — Well, that’s all Jesus said, really. All our lives are “fucked,” until we accept Jesus as our personal savior!

“You Mother Fucker. I’m Going to Fuck You. You’re Going to Regret You Ever Did This to Me.” — Everybody knows these are lines from Mel Gibson’s latest film, A Trial of Faith, about a man whose wife leaves him for a chinchilla in a state with same-sex marriage, triggering a crisis of faith that involves a lot of swearing at God. But don’t worry — the movie shows in the end that God can handle being sworn at, and eventually forgives Gibson. In the meantime, come on, the Saucy Aussie was just rehearsing his lines!

“I Own Malibu” — OK, well maybe he does. That’s a good thing to know: he’s a property owner, a good upstanding citizen and all. A nice factual statement.

“I’m Going to Get Even With You” — said to the police officer, this makes sense. Mel Gibson, upright conservative Christian paragon that he is, is only telling the nice office that he’s not going to “get odd” with him tonight. No fag boy, that Mel Gibson! We all breathe a sigh of relief.

“Fucking Jews” — well, they do “that,” you know. That’s how they perpetuate their scheme to overtake all the world’s population and turn them into banking customers!

“Are You A Jew?” Good thing to know, because if so, there’s one more Jew who needs a nice New Testament sent to them as a thank you gift and chance at salvation!

“The Jews are Responsible for all the Wars in the World.” OK. So. Well. This looks really bad. At first glance. But when you consider that um, well, with the hypotenuse of the square of the Pythagorean Theorem in the second case, the smiggledy smaggle of the plumbum in green mainly takes the exclusionary clause in an unnecessarily literal manner. You know what I mean? See, no problem!

Thank you, Mel Gibson, for continuing to show the gracious goodness of Christian conservatism the whole world through. I am your number one fan, and you are my hero!

Last week, I wrote about the need for 425,000 mommies to put those poor little frozen blastocysts in their uteruses, adopt them and raise them as their own precious snowflake babies. I said I would hook people up with some of those cute blastocysts, if only they would leave a comment with their contact information. H-e-double-toothpicks, I’d just take your e-mail address! I said I was sure that all the good conservative Christian mommies with intact uteruses would be sure to offer their services. After all, we’re talking about saving a human life here! Those blastocysts are babies! And who wouldn’t save a baby???

But nobody has volunteered.

Why? What am I missing here?

In response to USMARINE’s plagiarized “Make You Think”:

This’ll make ya stop & take a whizz!

Your alarm goes off, you hit your kid in the mouth instead of the snooze button, and go back to sleep.
She’s been cleaning out toilets at no charge since 3 this morning.

You drink coffee sitting in your comfortable chair in the suburbs.
She can’t drink coffee. It makes her indigestion flare up.

You complain of a “headache”, and don’t sleep with your significant other for a month.
Headache? She wishes she just had a headache! With that ear infection and that funny feeling in her tooth, things just haven’t been the same since 1987.

You put on your conservative christian conformist polo shirt, and go meet up with your lily white congregation.
While you’re walking in, she notices that your polo shirt has tomato sauce on it.

You make sure your cell phone is in your pocket.
She clutches the satanic emblem she had branded above her left nipple last month. Damn, but it still hurts.

You talk trash on your “buddies” that haven’t shown up for the Wayne County Republican Party Steering Committee Meeting for two months in a row.
She knows that you went down on your “buddies” last week in the rec room.

You walk down the beach, thinking about how much your conservative ideals make you want to rob people.
She was robbed just last week by a conservative meanie just like you.

You complain about how hot it is.
“Hot?” she says. “Well, it isn’t the heat so much as the humidity, is it, and let me tell you it has been so humid here that I don’t think I can get out of the house, but I do have to feed those 300 homeless kids down at the shelter.”

You go out to lunch, and complain because the restaurant sent you a Mexican waiter.
She kisses Mexicans waiters.

Your Mexican maid makes your bed and washes your clothes. Then you fire her and report her to the INS.
She teaches Mexican maids English as a Second Language.

You go to the mall and buy a “What Would Jesus Do?” bumper sticker, and run over a bunny rabbit on the way.
She makes bumper stickers using her leftover fingernail clippings, and gives all the proceeds to kids with leukemia.

You voted for George W. Bush, and sent him an illegal campaign contribution.
She votes Green Party all the way and has perfect white teeth.

You kick babies.
She loves babies.

Your kids are healthy and have a big trust fund.
Her kids are afflicted with chronic diseases affecting every major organ system.

You make jokes about Green Party voters.
She has to collect her own urine for some obscure medical reason.

You see only what the media wants you to see.
She sees the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth!

You are asked to save the little baby rabbits in the path of the lawn mower. You don’t.
She saves baby rabbits, all righty.

You sit there and judge her, saying that people who help people are stupid fucking idiots. Then you hit your mom in the teeth with a tire iron.
If only there were more Green Party voters like her.

If you love babies and the little fluffy bunnies repost this.
If you don’t repost this, you hate babies and the little fluffy bunnies.

I’ve done it again, dear reader. I am a testament to the wonder of God’s creation. I am proof that humanity is intelligently designed. I am, in short, really smart.

How can I say this? Well, it’s true. I have regularly solved the world’s problems by simply using the brainpower given to me by Our Lord God. And — voila — the answer comes! Thank you, Lord, for making me such a good problem-solver. I am happy to be your humble servant as I bring the answers to the little people of the world.

My latest Opus is the partial solution of the problem of the Budget Deficits in Washington, DC, those nasty bills left over from the Clinton years like a drying, cracked stain on a once-beautiful dress. The problem is that the Government spends more than it collects in taxes. The National Park Service alone had a budget of $2,259,000,000.00 in the year 2004 alone. To get rid of the budget deficit, we have to cut spending, and the National Park Service seems to me to be a great way to start. After all, there are no factories in the National Parks. There are no corporate headquarters in the National Parks. Industry benefits in no way whatsoever from our National Parks. So why have them at all?

I suggest we do two things:

1. Sell off the National Parks to the highest bidder. Let someone pay to buy Yellowstone and turn it into some kind of green hippy eco-commune geothermal power plant. Let someone pay to buy the Great Smokies National Park and put up a Great Smokies Smoked Sausage hog farm and factory there; it’s a great branding opportunity. I figure we’ll get a couple hundred $billion that way, which will go a long way to shrinking the budget deficit next year.

2. Take the National Park Service out of the budget. With no national parks, why have a National Park Service? So that some slacker pot-head Environmental Studies major can get a welfare job as a park ranger? I don’t think so. There we go: that’s $2.3 Billion saved every year!

Some Unitarian out there is going to give me a hard time about now. Let’s call him “Alastair CareBear.” Alastair CareBear the Unitarian will say, “but what about the wonder and awe these great places inspire? Without these outposts for nature, how can humanity maintain its soul, its connection with the earth and the great circle of life that I learned about in The Lion King?” Barf. It’s called A LAWN, you twit. If you don’t have enough awe and reverence for nature, GET A BIGGER LAWN.

But really, you don’t even need a lawn if you know that the true source of awe, wonder and reverence is God. All you need is a Bible and your behind in the pews on Sunday to get all the awe, wonder, reverence and SALVATION that you need, Mr. CareBear. I hope you discover the truth of that statement before your dying day, but that’s not for me, His Humble Servant, to control. Let Go and Let God, Alastair.

Let Go and Let God. Yes, that should be our new National Parks policy. Faith-Based National Parks! Before they pave over the Grand Tetons, someone take a slideshow and they can show it in all the Churches as a testament to God’s power. Then pave ‘em over, because who needs the originals when you’ve got a slideshow? Take the park names off the Rand McNally Atlases so nobody can find the parks anymore. And then the Reverends can explain how wonderful it is that these parks are there, but nobody can find them, and when someone asks for directions, what do we say?

“Ah! It is a Mystery! Let us proclaim the Mystery of Faith!”

Works every time — and cuts the national budget, too.

Faith-Based National Parks!

Thank you, Lord, for bestowing me with sheer Genius!

Yesterday brought us news that the Israeli military attacked an aid convoy as it was attempting to bring humanitarian assistance to Lebanese civilians struggling for survival under the blast of Israel’s attempts to punish violence from Hezbollah.

over the last week and a half, we’ve all learned very well, like good little catechism students, that Israel has a right to defend itself. That’s what the President has to say, so it must be true. So, should we conclude Israel is doing something wrong by launching attacks against humanitarian aid convoys?

Hell, no! What we must conclude is that Israel has the right to defend itself against humanitarian aid convoys! After all, that convoy made the bad choice of trying to provide assistance to civilians who were under Israeli attack. That makes them damned anti-Israel terrorists, right? The real enemy of peace is Jan Egeland from the United Nations, who has called for a 72-hour truce, right?

I mean, the answer couldn’t possibly be that Israel is doing the wrong thing. Fuck, no! After all, Israel is an ally of the United States of America, and as we all know, American allies could never, ever do anything wrong!

Could they?

I am tired of all the obeisance (thank you, Mr. Dictionary!) given to the Statue of Liberty by Lieberal Americans. I mean, look: it’s just a statue, given to New York (hello!) by the French (hello!). The Statue of Liberty did not sign the Declaration of Independence. The Statue of Liberty was not a Founding Father. The Statue of Liberty did not die for you in Vietnam!

No. The Statue of Liberty is a Trojan Horse (thank you, Mr. History Book!) given to us to infiltrate our society and fill it with wrong thinking by those communards, the French baguette monkeys. Just look at Emma Lazarus’s poem inscribed upon its base:

Lady Liberty? Hah! We have been worshipping a French Communist Whore!

This’ll make ya stop & think!

Your alarm goes off, you hit the snooze and sleep for another 10 minutes.
He stays up for days on end.

You take a warm shower to help you wake up.
He goes days or weeks without running water.

You complain of a “headache”, and call in sick.
He gets shot at, as others are hit, and keeps moving forward.

You put on your anti war/don’t support the troops shirt, and go meet up with your friends.

He still fights for your right to wear that shirt.

You make sure you’re cell phone is in your pocket.
He clutches the cross hanging on his chain next to his dog tags.

You talk trash on your “buddies” that aren’t with you.
He knows he may not see some of his buddies again.

You walk down the beach, staring at all the pretty girls.
He walks the streets, searching for insurgents and terrorists.

You complain about how hot it is.
He wears his heavy gear, not daring to take off his helmet to wipe his brow.

You go out to lunch, and complain because the restaurant got your order wrong.

He does not get to eat today.

Your maid makes your bed and washes your clothes.
He wears the same things for months, but makes sure his weapons are clean.

You go to the mall and get your hair redone.
He doesn’t have time to brush his teeth today.

You are angry because your class ran 5 minutes over.
He is told he will be held an extra 2 months.

You call your girlfriend and set a date for that night.
He waits for the mail to see if there is a letter from home.

You hug and kiss your girlfriend, like you do everyday.
He holds his letter close and smells his love’s perfume.

You roll your eyes as a baby cries.
He gets a letter with pictures of his new child, and wonders if they’ll ever meet.

You criticize your government, and say that war never solves anything.

He sees the innocent tortured and killed by their own government and remembers why he is fighting.

You hear the jokes about the war, and make fun of the men like him.
He hears the gun fire and bombs.

You see only what the media wants you to see.
He sees the bodies lying around him.

You are asked to go to the store by your parents. You don’t.

He does what he is told.

You stay at home and watch TV.
He takes whatever time he is given to call and write home, sleep, and eat.

You crawl into your bed, with down pillows, and try to get comfortable.

He crawls under a tank for shade and a 5 minute nap, only to be woken by gun fire.

You sit there and judge him, saying the world is a worse place because of men like him.

If only there were more men like him.

If you support our troops repost this.

On the coast of Spain, the dues of global warming are coming in stings and jolts to tens of thousands of people. I’m talking jellyfish. Jellyfish are beginning an invasion of Europe!

Millions, probably billions, of jellyfish are amassing along Spain’s eastern shores. In the last week alone, over three thousand Spaniards have been attacked and treated by the Red Cross! Those who didn’t make it out alive will never be counted.

Why? Why is this happening? Environmentalists have one answer: They point out that the oceans have been overfished, removing the predators who would ordinarily keep jellyfish in check. At the same time, warming of ocean temperatures encourages plankton blooms upon which the jellyfish can feed and swarm.

All that may be true, but I think there’s something more to it. I have a theory that, when they are assembled in massive swarms, in sea water which is electrically conductive, they form a gigantic oceanic neural net, a collective consciousness. The jellyfish are growing into a giant brain!

Think all those attacks were accidental? No way in hell! The jellyfish brain is too smart to mistake a person for plankton.

They’re up to something… and if global temperatures keep climbing, it won’t be long before that giant jellyfish brain reaches America. A jellyfish brain that large won’t be stopped at our shores. It will find a way to invade the land… Perhaps Spain is just a trial run.

Beware the coming invasion of land jellyfish!