Note to Journalists Regarding the Tony Kushner/CUNY Board of Trustees Story:
Just sayin', but if the Rude Pundit was a good journalist and he was looking into why Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tony Kushner was denied an honorary degree at John Jay College by the Board of Trustees of the City University of New York thanks in large part to trustee Jeffrey Wiesenfeld objecting to Kushner's criticism of Israel, he might look at this angle:
In 2007, the College of Staten Island, another CUNY school, gave an honorary degree to Democracy Now's Amy Goodman. Goodman, who, like Kushner, is Jewish, is routinely condemned as an anti-Semite for her views of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Indeed, not a week goes by without a report on Democracy Now about the mistreatment of the people of Gaza.
You know who was on the CUNY Board of Trustees, which has to approve all of these honorary degrees, at the time? Jeffrey Wiesenfeld.
Huh. Two people with the same level of criticism of Israel. Wonder what's different about Kushner. One wonders...
Now, go get 'em, tigers
Thursday, May 05, 2011
On The Ed Show Tonight:
The Rude Pundit is returning to The Ed Show tonight at 10 p.m. Eastern on MSNBC. He'll be talking about punk-ass Republicans.
(And if you're visiting here for the first time, welcome to the free joints. Just buy the goddamn book you see over to the side there. It's available from OR Books and Amazon.)
The Rude Pundit is returning to The Ed Show tonight at 10 p.m. Eastern on MSNBC. He'll be talking about punk-ass Republicans.
(And if you're visiting here for the first time, welcome to the free joints. Just buy the goddamn book you see over to the side there. It's available from OR Books and Amazon.)
Even If Torture Led to Bin Laden, It Was Wrong:
The right-wing is indulging in an orgy of self-congratulations over the supposed success in using torture...no, sorry, "enhanced interrogation techniques"...no, wait, torture in the killing of Osama bin Laden. "Coerced interrogation led, in part, to the death of bin Laden," said Fox "news" host Bill O'Reilly while getting a rim job from an eager Karl Rove while the Wall Street Journal editorial board was in a circle jerk, declaring the action "a vindication of Mr. Bush's interrogation policies" while spewing sperm all over the tits of a grateful Ann Coulter as she cuntishly screeched about "the same interrogations endlessly denounced by the entire Democratic Party (save Joe Lieberman), the mainstream media, and an especially indignant Jane Mayer in The New Yorker," and Sean Hannity was fellating Donald Rumsfeld so hard that the former Secretary of Defense was afraid he'd break a hip as Hannity said, through laps and gulps, "George Bush was in fact right." In the dark corner, a lonely Rush Limbaugh smoked a cigar and masturbated slowly as he gazed on the scene. On a big screen, Abu Ghraib images were accompanied by a soundtrack of screams. It's the typical mood-setter for conservatives.
Torture, motherfuckers, is what got us off, right? No, not really. Let's just demolish this shit now, shall we? In three easy steps?
1. Even if a piece of information was given up eight years ago that was some small piece in the final puzzle, we also know that waterboarded prisoners and others gave tons of false information, things that threw American intelligence off the trail for years and had them chasing phantoms. So how much time was wasted? How long was justice delayed? You might have had a case had a waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed said immediately, "Oh, shit, Osama's living large in his pimped-out Pakistan compound and here's the address." He didn't. It went the way torture usually goes: with bullshit heaped upon rat turds and poor bastards needing to sift through the pile for the possible splinter of a diamond.
2. It's a fantasy to say that torture and only torture led to the bin Laden raid, the grain of sand that became the pearl of bullet in bin Laden's face. If we're gonna pretend, let's say that the United States treated prisoners humanely. Let's say that word spread throughout the Arab world that America wasn't beating the shit out of people and sending them to Egypt to have their nuts fried. One must wonder how much sooner we might have gotten something more solid than a nickname of a courier.
3. Finally, in the end, here's why your torture program is merely the madness of thugs and warlords: innocent people were tortured, through rendition, if not outright by the CIA. Osama bin Laden wasn't a ticking time bomb. He was a prisoner in a house who couldn't even step out into sunshine for fear of detection. No scenario exists here that would justify the calculated mistreatment of people who were mistaken for terrorists.
What exists is the pathetic willingness of so, so many in this nation to cast aside our morality and laws for the expedience (no matter how long it took) of vengeance. Frankly, if the only way to get to bin Laden was waterboarding, the Rude Pundit would have rather bin Laden had stayed free. Because the Rude Pundit is more goddamned patriotic than any of these fuckers who put their animal instincts over the truly ethical principles that are supposed to guide us.
And you know who would back him up? Benjamin Franklin, man. In a mucho-quoted sentence, Franklin said, "That it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer, is a Maxim that has been long and generally approved; never, that I know of, controverted." Except, of course, the false patriots of the right.
The right-wing is indulging in an orgy of self-congratulations over the supposed success in using torture...no, sorry, "enhanced interrogation techniques"...no, wait, torture in the killing of Osama bin Laden. "Coerced interrogation led, in part, to the death of bin Laden," said Fox "news" host Bill O'Reilly while getting a rim job from an eager Karl Rove while the Wall Street Journal editorial board was in a circle jerk, declaring the action "a vindication of Mr. Bush's interrogation policies" while spewing sperm all over the tits of a grateful Ann Coulter as she cuntishly screeched about "the same interrogations endlessly denounced by the entire Democratic Party (save Joe Lieberman), the mainstream media, and an especially indignant Jane Mayer in The New Yorker," and Sean Hannity was fellating Donald Rumsfeld so hard that the former Secretary of Defense was afraid he'd break a hip as Hannity said, through laps and gulps, "George Bush was in fact right." In the dark corner, a lonely Rush Limbaugh smoked a cigar and masturbated slowly as he gazed on the scene. On a big screen, Abu Ghraib images were accompanied by a soundtrack of screams. It's the typical mood-setter for conservatives.
Torture, motherfuckers, is what got us off, right? No, not really. Let's just demolish this shit now, shall we? In three easy steps?
1. Even if a piece of information was given up eight years ago that was some small piece in the final puzzle, we also know that waterboarded prisoners and others gave tons of false information, things that threw American intelligence off the trail for years and had them chasing phantoms. So how much time was wasted? How long was justice delayed? You might have had a case had a waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed said immediately, "Oh, shit, Osama's living large in his pimped-out Pakistan compound and here's the address." He didn't. It went the way torture usually goes: with bullshit heaped upon rat turds and poor bastards needing to sift through the pile for the possible splinter of a diamond.
2. It's a fantasy to say that torture and only torture led to the bin Laden raid, the grain of sand that became the pearl of bullet in bin Laden's face. If we're gonna pretend, let's say that the United States treated prisoners humanely. Let's say that word spread throughout the Arab world that America wasn't beating the shit out of people and sending them to Egypt to have their nuts fried. One must wonder how much sooner we might have gotten something more solid than a nickname of a courier.
3. Finally, in the end, here's why your torture program is merely the madness of thugs and warlords: innocent people were tortured, through rendition, if not outright by the CIA. Osama bin Laden wasn't a ticking time bomb. He was a prisoner in a house who couldn't even step out into sunshine for fear of detection. No scenario exists here that would justify the calculated mistreatment of people who were mistaken for terrorists.
What exists is the pathetic willingness of so, so many in this nation to cast aside our morality and laws for the expedience (no matter how long it took) of vengeance. Frankly, if the only way to get to bin Laden was waterboarding, the Rude Pundit would have rather bin Laden had stayed free. Because the Rude Pundit is more goddamned patriotic than any of these fuckers who put their animal instincts over the truly ethical principles that are supposed to guide us.
And you know who would back him up? Benjamin Franklin, man. In a mucho-quoted sentence, Franklin said, "That it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer, is a Maxim that has been long and generally approved; never, that I know of, controverted." Except, of course, the false patriots of the right.
Wednesday, May 04, 2011
Torture Enabler John Yoo Tries Again to Justify His Awful Existence:
If you're male and law professor and former Bush administration Justice Department official John Yoo were ever to kick you in the balls, he'd try to convince you that your balls got in the way of a legitimate place his foot could go. He'd write a long memo about legal precedence of the foot over the balls and how contact with said balls is not only protected, but, indeed, part and parcel of a view of foot supremacy that says the balls are merely low-hanging orbs to be batted out its way.
In other words, John Yoo is a motherfucker. The dude who crafted the legal justification for the CIA to use waterboarding and other charming "enhanced interrogation techniques" has been out in the right-wing nutzoidosphere frantically re-re-re-arguing that the killing of Osama bin Laden has given his pathetic life meaning. Here he is in today's Wall Street Journal (motto: "Rupert Murdoch's asshole smells of wallaby meat"): "Sunday's success also vindicates the Bush administration...The United States located al Qaeda's leader by learning the identity of a trusted courier from the tough interrogations of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the architect of the 9/11 attacks, and his successor, Abu Faraj al-Libi." Except, you know, chances are that Mohammed didn't give up the real info until after the torture ended.
'Cause, see, here's the Washington Post on September 10, 2006: The team searching for bin Laden "have not received a credible lead in more than two years. Nothing from the vast U.S. intelligence world -- no tips from informants, no snippets from electronic intercepts, no points on any satellite image -- has led them anywhere near the al-Qaeda leader, according to U.S. and Pakistani officials." Waterboarding was halted by Michael Hayden earlier in 2006.
Then Yoo disappears into fantasyland, where a pussy Barack Obama can't tie his own shoes, let alone deal with terrorists: "Imagine what would have happened if the Obama administration had been running things immediately following 9/11. After their 'arrest,' we would have read KSM and al-Libi their Miranda rights, provided them legal counsel, sent them to the U.S. for detention, and granted them all the rights provided a U.S. citizen in criminal proceedings." He faults Obama for not capturing bin Laden alive and then torturing him (no, really). He concludes by calling on the President to restart the interrogation techniques.
Goddamnit, you gotta give Yoo points for consistency. This motherfucker has been making his pro-torture case for years now. He is out there constantly, making sure that his legacy, long after his foul tenure ended, is something more than "that creepy cocksucker who degraded America." No, he's gotta make it that he is responsible in some small way for getting to bin Laden, when, in reality, all he did was piss on the Constitution because, he said, the ink needed a good cleaning.
If you're male and law professor and former Bush administration Justice Department official John Yoo were ever to kick you in the balls, he'd try to convince you that your balls got in the way of a legitimate place his foot could go. He'd write a long memo about legal precedence of the foot over the balls and how contact with said balls is not only protected, but, indeed, part and parcel of a view of foot supremacy that says the balls are merely low-hanging orbs to be batted out its way.
In other words, John Yoo is a motherfucker. The dude who crafted the legal justification for the CIA to use waterboarding and other charming "enhanced interrogation techniques" has been out in the right-wing nutzoidosphere frantically re-re-re-arguing that the killing of Osama bin Laden has given his pathetic life meaning. Here he is in today's Wall Street Journal (motto: "Rupert Murdoch's asshole smells of wallaby meat"): "Sunday's success also vindicates the Bush administration...The United States located al Qaeda's leader by learning the identity of a trusted courier from the tough interrogations of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the architect of the 9/11 attacks, and his successor, Abu Faraj al-Libi." Except, you know, chances are that Mohammed didn't give up the real info until after the torture ended.
'Cause, see, here's the Washington Post on September 10, 2006: The team searching for bin Laden "have not received a credible lead in more than two years. Nothing from the vast U.S. intelligence world -- no tips from informants, no snippets from electronic intercepts, no points on any satellite image -- has led them anywhere near the al-Qaeda leader, according to U.S. and Pakistani officials." Waterboarding was halted by Michael Hayden earlier in 2006.
Then Yoo disappears into fantasyland, where a pussy Barack Obama can't tie his own shoes, let alone deal with terrorists: "Imagine what would have happened if the Obama administration had been running things immediately following 9/11. After their 'arrest,' we would have read KSM and al-Libi their Miranda rights, provided them legal counsel, sent them to the U.S. for detention, and granted them all the rights provided a U.S. citizen in criminal proceedings." He faults Obama for not capturing bin Laden alive and then torturing him (no, really). He concludes by calling on the President to restart the interrogation techniques.
Goddamnit, you gotta give Yoo points for consistency. This motherfucker has been making his pro-torture case for years now. He is out there constantly, making sure that his legacy, long after his foul tenure ended, is something more than "that creepy cocksucker who degraded America." No, he's gotta make it that he is responsible in some small way for getting to bin Laden, when, in reality, all he did was piss on the Constitution because, he said, the ink needed a good cleaning.
Tuesday, May 03, 2011
A Few More Random Observations Regarding the Death of a Rich Terrorist:
1. Chances are that the bin Laden compound raid didn't go down as described. Chances are that it was "just execute the fucker," despite the White House saying that the soldiers were told that they should arrest bin Laden if he surrendered.
2. The Rude Pundit doesn't give a fuck about conspiracies on the left and right that say that bin Laden's been dead for years and they're just now bringing out the body (if so, the timing sucks - the White House could have at least waited until next summer) or that bin Laden's not really dead. If you've got some evidence, pony it up. Otherwise, let's just say the fucker's dead and died the other day. You can come up with all kinds of suspicions (the same date that the U.S. was informed that Hitler was dead? The same date as Bush's "Mission Accomplished" debacle? During Celebrity Apprentice?) but considering the number of Bush administration officials who are going along with the story, it'd have to be a huge fucking conspiracy. Let's just go with the easiest answer.
3. Let's also not overstate bin Laden's importance or, for that matter, al-Qaeda's. At this point, it's sort of like killing Mr. Met and saying that you've defeated the whole team for the season.
4. So sorry to smack down that waterboarding boner that torture advocates have popped by hoping beyond hope that the first piece of information that eventually led to Osama bin Laden's big-ass house. But it wasn't waterboarding of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Oh, were real life as poetic and plot-driven. Not only has Donald "No, Really, I'm Still Alive" Rumsfeld stated so explicitly, but the timeline on when the information was gathered doesn't jibe with the use of it. In fact, what it seems is that, a few years after being tortured, when he was being treated according to the Geneva Conventions, Mohammed gave up the nickname of the courier. So suck on that, Bush apologists. He's still a war criminal.
5. "I can't go on the roof of my apartment building and smoke a fucking cigarette without a half-dozen neighbors yelling at me," said a friend last night. "So don't tell me there's a big-ass house with barbed wire in the middle of town and no one knows what's going on there." Or, in other words, fuck you, Pakistan.
6. Man, bin Laden was just a pampered pussy. Like every con artist TV preacher, he just lived in a huge house while his followers groveled in the dirt, releasing tapes about jihad and battle while he stayed close to his dialysis machine and his private chef, getting his balls washed daily by his servants. If nothing else crushes the remnants of al-Qaeda, the image of Osama bin Laden sitting on a toilet in his climate-controlled bathroom ought to destroy the spirit of even the most hardened Muslim extremist. Well, that and the fact that all that bin Laden cash just dried up real fast.
7. It's kind of pathetic to see Republicans sputtering, "But, but, Bush...no, Bush good." You know what? Obama sealed the deal. It's like when a lover tells you that you're the best fuck she's ever had. Other lovers laid the groundwork, sure, through their fumbling fucks and their decent fucks. But why should she thank them when you're the one who got her off so damn good?
1. Chances are that the bin Laden compound raid didn't go down as described. Chances are that it was "just execute the fucker," despite the White House saying that the soldiers were told that they should arrest bin Laden if he surrendered.
2. The Rude Pundit doesn't give a fuck about conspiracies on the left and right that say that bin Laden's been dead for years and they're just now bringing out the body (if so, the timing sucks - the White House could have at least waited until next summer) or that bin Laden's not really dead. If you've got some evidence, pony it up. Otherwise, let's just say the fucker's dead and died the other day. You can come up with all kinds of suspicions (the same date that the U.S. was informed that Hitler was dead? The same date as Bush's "Mission Accomplished" debacle? During Celebrity Apprentice?) but considering the number of Bush administration officials who are going along with the story, it'd have to be a huge fucking conspiracy. Let's just go with the easiest answer.
3. Let's also not overstate bin Laden's importance or, for that matter, al-Qaeda's. At this point, it's sort of like killing Mr. Met and saying that you've defeated the whole team for the season.
4. So sorry to smack down that waterboarding boner that torture advocates have popped by hoping beyond hope that the first piece of information that eventually led to Osama bin Laden's big-ass house. But it wasn't waterboarding of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Oh, were real life as poetic and plot-driven. Not only has Donald "No, Really, I'm Still Alive" Rumsfeld stated so explicitly, but the timeline on when the information was gathered doesn't jibe with the use of it. In fact, what it seems is that, a few years after being tortured, when he was being treated according to the Geneva Conventions, Mohammed gave up the nickname of the courier. So suck on that, Bush apologists. He's still a war criminal.
5. "I can't go on the roof of my apartment building and smoke a fucking cigarette without a half-dozen neighbors yelling at me," said a friend last night. "So don't tell me there's a big-ass house with barbed wire in the middle of town and no one knows what's going on there." Or, in other words, fuck you, Pakistan.
6. Man, bin Laden was just a pampered pussy. Like every con artist TV preacher, he just lived in a huge house while his followers groveled in the dirt, releasing tapes about jihad and battle while he stayed close to his dialysis machine and his private chef, getting his balls washed daily by his servants. If nothing else crushes the remnants of al-Qaeda, the image of Osama bin Laden sitting on a toilet in his climate-controlled bathroom ought to destroy the spirit of even the most hardened Muslim extremist. Well, that and the fact that all that bin Laden cash just dried up real fast.
7. It's kind of pathetic to see Republicans sputtering, "But, but, Bush...no, Bush good." You know what? Obama sealed the deal. It's like when a lover tells you that you're the best fuck she's ever had. Other lovers laid the groundwork, sure, through their fumbling fucks and their decent fucks. But why should she thank them when you're the one who got her off so damn good?
Monday, May 02, 2011
Dead Terrorist (In Brief):
Yeah, you know, the woman who climbed the light pole near Ground Zero late last night and flashed her bra to the cheering, chanting crowd, according to WNYC, that was probably someone who didn't really get what the hell just happened. Or someone who just associated any occasion with drunkenness and tit-showing. America loves booze, boobs, and killing.
Yes, yes, let's get it out of our systems. Look, hey, sure, fine, enjoy yourselves, dear, happy Americans, holding that Osamagasm in for ten long years. How nice it must be to finally spew that jizz of jingoism right into dead bin Laden's bullet hole. Oh, shit, yeah, it's good to be a liberal who gets to be bloodthirsty for the right reasons. How sweet it is, no?
No, really, though. It's okay for a second or two to say, "Yippee-kay-yay, motherfuckers." It's okay to enjoy the defeat of an avowed violent asshole. It happens everywhere. When the execution of dictator Nicolai Ceausescu was announced in 1989, Romania exploded into celebration and debauchery. So, you know, it's human, so tragically human, to dance over the remains of your enemies. Have at for a few minutes. And then let's clean off the patriotic spunk and get back to work.
Are we leaving Afghanistan now, let alone Iraq? Are we going to stop the relentless cutting back of civil liberties? Are Republicans gonna treat President Obama like a leader and not the lawn jockey who won the lottery? (That we'll discuss later.)
One last note: the Rude Pundit finds it sadly funny that, after a trillion plus dollars spent on the wars, after thousands of soldiers killed, that what it took to get Osama bin Laden was a criminal investigation and an intelligence operation followed by a quick strike. As we ponder our dead, all our dead, as we remember and make silly statements about "closure," let us wonder what might have been for the United States had that been our approach all along.
Yeah, you know, the woman who climbed the light pole near Ground Zero late last night and flashed her bra to the cheering, chanting crowd, according to WNYC, that was probably someone who didn't really get what the hell just happened. Or someone who just associated any occasion with drunkenness and tit-showing. America loves booze, boobs, and killing.
Yes, yes, let's get it out of our systems. Look, hey, sure, fine, enjoy yourselves, dear, happy Americans, holding that Osamagasm in for ten long years. How nice it must be to finally spew that jizz of jingoism right into dead bin Laden's bullet hole. Oh, shit, yeah, it's good to be a liberal who gets to be bloodthirsty for the right reasons. How sweet it is, no?
No, really, though. It's okay for a second or two to say, "Yippee-kay-yay, motherfuckers." It's okay to enjoy the defeat of an avowed violent asshole. It happens everywhere. When the execution of dictator Nicolai Ceausescu was announced in 1989, Romania exploded into celebration and debauchery. So, you know, it's human, so tragically human, to dance over the remains of your enemies. Have at for a few minutes. And then let's clean off the patriotic spunk and get back to work.
Are we leaving Afghanistan now, let alone Iraq? Are we going to stop the relentless cutting back of civil liberties? Are Republicans gonna treat President Obama like a leader and not the lawn jockey who won the lottery? (That we'll discuss later.)
One last note: the Rude Pundit finds it sadly funny that, after a trillion plus dollars spent on the wars, after thousands of soldiers killed, that what it took to get Osama bin Laden was a criminal investigation and an intelligence operation followed by a quick strike. As we ponder our dead, all our dead, as we remember and make silly statements about "closure," let us wonder what might have been for the United States had that been our approach all along.
Sunday, May 01, 2011
You Want to Come to the Rude Pundit's NYC Reading on Monday, May 2:
Just one more goddamn reminder: On Monday (that's tomorrow or today or, if you're late, yesterday), the Rude Pundit will be reading at the Half King in New York City. Manhattan, to be preciser.
The comfy bar, the kind of place where Norman Mailer would gladly box Ernest Hemingway while Dylan Thomas drifted into a coma in the corner, is at 505 W. 23rd Street.
The event's from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. That probably means reading/questions starting a little after 7. Drinking for much of the rest of the time. The reading's free.
You can just show up, or, if you're feeling social network-y, you can RSVP at the Facebook.
Just one more goddamn reminder: On Monday (that's tomorrow or today or, if you're late, yesterday), the Rude Pundit will be reading at the Half King in New York City. Manhattan, to be preciser.
The comfy bar, the kind of place where Norman Mailer would gladly box Ernest Hemingway while Dylan Thomas drifted into a coma in the corner, is at 505 W. 23rd Street.
The event's from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. That probably means reading/questions starting a little after 7. Drinking for much of the rest of the time. The reading's free.
You can just show up, or, if you're feeling social network-y, you can RSVP at the Facebook.
Friday, April 29, 2011
Delightful Scenes from Today's Royal Wedding:
(Note: Photos may not necessarily be of the royal wedding.)
Their Royal Highnesses Prince William, Duke of Cambridge and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge kiss on the balcony at Buckingham Palace on April 29 in London, England. The marriage of the second in line to the British throne was led by the Archbishop of Canterbury and was attended by 1900 guests, including foreign Royal family members and heads of state. Thousands of well-wishers from around the world have also flocked to London to witness the spectacle and pageantry of the Royal Wedding.
Larry, the Downing Street cat, in a Union flag bow-tie in the Cabinet Room at number 10 Downing Street on Thursday, April 28, in London.
Royal supporters share a laugh as they wait along the processional route on the day of the wedding of Britain's Prince William and Kate Middleton, on April 29 in central London.
Alexander McQueen gown designer Sarah Burton (bottom L) adjusts Britain's Kate Middleton's dress as she arrives with her father Michael Middleton at Westminster Abbey.
(Note: Photos may not necessarily be of the royal wedding.)
Their Royal Highnesses Prince William, Duke of Cambridge and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge kiss on the balcony at Buckingham Palace on April 29 in London, England. The marriage of the second in line to the British throne was led by the Archbishop of Canterbury and was attended by 1900 guests, including foreign Royal family members and heads of state. Thousands of well-wishers from around the world have also flocked to London to witness the spectacle and pageantry of the Royal Wedding.
Larry, the Downing Street cat, in a Union flag bow-tie in the Cabinet Room at number 10 Downing Street on Thursday, April 28, in London.
Royal supporters share a laugh as they wait along the processional route on the day of the wedding of Britain's Prince William and Kate Middleton, on April 29 in central London.
Alexander McQueen gown designer Sarah Burton (bottom L) adjusts Britain's Kate Middleton's dress as she arrives with her father Michael Middleton at Westminster Abbey.
Thursday, April 28, 2011
One More Goddamn Birther Post:
Here's the thing about Donald Trump: you can call him a "puke-sucking, human-shaped lump of shit who jacks off while getting fucked in the ass by sweaty sumo wrestlers" and he'd just thank you for the attention. So there's nothing bad you can say about the lying garbage heap because he doesn't care. What you can say is that anyone who gave a goddamn what he has to say about anything any time is a fucking imbecile. If you take your political advice from the man who "fired" LaToya Jackson from a fake job on a shitty TV show with a straight face, then you pretty much deserve whatever terrible things are coming your way.
Yesterday, we were greeted to the media version of a police stop and frisk. For the crime of presidenting while black, Barack Obama was forced to prove his innocence. The whole spectacle of the release of the so-called "long-form" birth certificate and Obama's speech after was degrading to all of us. In one way, the White House paid a ransom to the racists who were constantly attacking him. In another, it was a rather masterful political move by the White House: let's call a bluff and demonstrate just how irrational these fuckers are. Oh, and let's get a shitload of sympathy from the the left, who have been kicking our asses lately. Because this liberal Obama critic felt nothing but sympathy for the man yesterday for being told, as others have eloquently put it, to show us your papers. What a childish nation we are.
How mind-boggling is this? And how sadly not unexpected. And what's also sadly not unexpected is the reaction from the birthers. It's a forgery, it's not enough, it needs to go through forensics testing, what about his grades, what about his Social Security number, what about his Muslim connections, what about, what about, show us, show us. Seriously, could you guys just start saying, "That uppity nigger should be lynched"? Could you say that you're all het up because he looked at Hillary Clinton funny? Could you just stop pretending that anything else - anything else - is going on here other than that you hate black people with power? Because what you're doing is asking someone to prove shit when you don't have a scintilla of real evidence to support the crime you're accusing Obama of committing. What's next? Dig up his dead father to get DNA samples?
Shit, could Obama just get an intern to blow him in the Oval Office? Because, at this point, that fucking debacle makes sense. Hell, calling Bill Clinton a coke-snorting murderer just seems quaint.
Last night, the Rude Pundit was driven to MSNBC in a very big SUV that lacked a bar. The chauffeur asked what the Rude Pundit was going to talk about on the news network. When he said the birth certificate nonsense, the chauffeur went on about how it's a fake, how Obama "lies" all the time. "Every word out of his mouth is a lie," he said when the Rude Pundit asked him for one example. So of course the birth certificate was another lie. "Why did he keep it secret? What does he not release his marks in school?" the driver went on. He parroted every conspiracy website, every Fox "news" bullshit meme, every talk radio talking point: Obama gets all his power from illegal immigrants; Obama uses Chicago-style political tactics (which really just means "Democrats not acting like pussies"); and, of course, of course, Obama is a Muslim who is obviously attempting to destroy America with tactics straight out of Mein Kampf. Oh, and liberals want to kill all their enemies. It was fucking surreal.
So, yeah, we have a bigger birth certificate. But those who despise the president for existing don't give a happy monkey fuck and will continue to challenge Obama's legitimacy until he declares he is white. Otherwise, if they accepted the birth certificate and moved the fuck on, they'd have to deal with "issues" and use their so-called "brains."
By the way, on the way home, the same driver was bemoaning the treatment of Sarah Palin's children by the media. When the Rude Pundit pointed out how right-wingers talked about Chelsea Clinton, the driver said, "Well, she has terrible parents. And she was kind of ugly."
By the way, the one thing the Rude Pundit and the chauffeur agreed on was, as he put it, "Donald Trump is an ass."
Here's the thing about Donald Trump: you can call him a "puke-sucking, human-shaped lump of shit who jacks off while getting fucked in the ass by sweaty sumo wrestlers" and he'd just thank you for the attention. So there's nothing bad you can say about the lying garbage heap because he doesn't care. What you can say is that anyone who gave a goddamn what he has to say about anything any time is a fucking imbecile. If you take your political advice from the man who "fired" LaToya Jackson from a fake job on a shitty TV show with a straight face, then you pretty much deserve whatever terrible things are coming your way.
Yesterday, we were greeted to the media version of a police stop and frisk. For the crime of presidenting while black, Barack Obama was forced to prove his innocence. The whole spectacle of the release of the so-called "long-form" birth certificate and Obama's speech after was degrading to all of us. In one way, the White House paid a ransom to the racists who were constantly attacking him. In another, it was a rather masterful political move by the White House: let's call a bluff and demonstrate just how irrational these fuckers are. Oh, and let's get a shitload of sympathy from the the left, who have been kicking our asses lately. Because this liberal Obama critic felt nothing but sympathy for the man yesterday for being told, as others have eloquently put it, to show us your papers. What a childish nation we are.
How mind-boggling is this? And how sadly not unexpected. And what's also sadly not unexpected is the reaction from the birthers. It's a forgery, it's not enough, it needs to go through forensics testing, what about his grades, what about his Social Security number, what about his Muslim connections, what about, what about, show us, show us. Seriously, could you guys just start saying, "That uppity nigger should be lynched"? Could you say that you're all het up because he looked at Hillary Clinton funny? Could you just stop pretending that anything else - anything else - is going on here other than that you hate black people with power? Because what you're doing is asking someone to prove shit when you don't have a scintilla of real evidence to support the crime you're accusing Obama of committing. What's next? Dig up his dead father to get DNA samples?
Shit, could Obama just get an intern to blow him in the Oval Office? Because, at this point, that fucking debacle makes sense. Hell, calling Bill Clinton a coke-snorting murderer just seems quaint.
Last night, the Rude Pundit was driven to MSNBC in a very big SUV that lacked a bar. The chauffeur asked what the Rude Pundit was going to talk about on the news network. When he said the birth certificate nonsense, the chauffeur went on about how it's a fake, how Obama "lies" all the time. "Every word out of his mouth is a lie," he said when the Rude Pundit asked him for one example. So of course the birth certificate was another lie. "Why did he keep it secret? What does he not release his marks in school?" the driver went on. He parroted every conspiracy website, every Fox "news" bullshit meme, every talk radio talking point: Obama gets all his power from illegal immigrants; Obama uses Chicago-style political tactics (which really just means "Democrats not acting like pussies"); and, of course, of course, Obama is a Muslim who is obviously attempting to destroy America with tactics straight out of Mein Kampf. Oh, and liberals want to kill all their enemies. It was fucking surreal.
So, yeah, we have a bigger birth certificate. But those who despise the president for existing don't give a happy monkey fuck and will continue to challenge Obama's legitimacy until he declares he is white. Otherwise, if they accepted the birth certificate and moved the fuck on, they'd have to deal with "issues" and use their so-called "brains."
By the way, on the way home, the same driver was bemoaning the treatment of Sarah Palin's children by the media. When the Rude Pundit pointed out how right-wingers talked about Chelsea Clinton, the driver said, "Well, she has terrible parents. And she was kind of ugly."
By the way, the one thing the Rude Pundit and the chauffeur agreed on was, as he put it, "Donald Trump is an ass."
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
The Rude Pundit Live in NYC:
He'll be reading from his new book at the Half King, the bar and restaurant co-owned by author/filmmaker Sebastian Junger. Come on out for drinks and merriment and drinks with the Rude Pundit. Books will be signed. And there will be drinking. It's on Monday, May 2 at 7 p.m. The Half King is at 505 W. 23rd Street.
Let the people know by RSVPing on the Facebook.
Oh, and check out the video of the Rude Pundit on MSNBC's The Ed Show a couple of hours ago
He'll be reading from his new book at the Half King, the bar and restaurant co-owned by author/filmmaker Sebastian Junger. Come on out for drinks and merriment and drinks with the Rude Pundit. Books will be signed. And there will be drinking. It's on Monday, May 2 at 7 p.m. The Half King is at 505 W. 23rd Street.
Let the people know by RSVPing on the Facebook.
Oh, and check out the video of the Rude Pundit on MSNBC's The Ed Show a couple of hours ago
The Rude Pundit on The Ed Show Tonight:
Yep, the Rude Pundit makes his national TV debut tonight on MSNBC's Ed Show with Ed Schultz at 10 p.m. And this birth certificate thing has got him feelin' mean.
If you're visiting this merry blog for the first time, enjoy the snacks, share the beer, and, for fuck's sake, buy the book.
(You can order The Rude Pundit's Almanack from OR Books or get it for your Kindle or Nook or other things that are not made of trees.)
Yep, the Rude Pundit makes his national TV debut tonight on MSNBC's Ed Show with Ed Schultz at 10 p.m. And this birth certificate thing has got him feelin' mean.
If you're visiting this merry blog for the first time, enjoy the snacks, share the beer, and, for fuck's sake, buy the book.
(You can order The Rude Pundit's Almanack from OR Books or get it for your Kindle or Nook or other things that are not made of trees.)
Praise Paul Clement for Taking the DOMA Case? Fuck That Guy:
So Bush the Dumber's former Solicitor General, Paul Clement, got hired by congressional Republicans to defend the Defense of Marriage Act, which says, in essence, "Queer love is icky," because the Obama administration finally decided there is some shit they will not eat and refuses to defend it in court. Clement's big-ass law firm, King and Spaulding, under criticism from the Human Rights Campaign and others, decided to cover its financial ass and drop the case. Then Clement quit the firm on principle and took his wubby over to a smaller firm. Then Obama's Attorney General Eric Holder criticized the gay rights groups for criticizing the law firm and said, "Paul Clement is a great lawyer and has done a lot of really great things for this nation." And others are aghast at the way Clement has been treated when all that happened was, after all, free enterprise, supply and demand, man.
Why are Democrats going out of their way to praise Clement? On DOMA and a hundred other things, fuck that guy. Motherfucker was Bush's Solicitor General. That means he signed off on the evil shit that Democrats are supposed to have opposed, including waterboarding. He became acting Attorney General after Alberto Gonzales was whipped out of DC like a rabid pug bitch.
Here's Clement defending power of the president during wartime to the Supreme Court in the 2004 Jose Padilla case: "I think the fact that executive discretion in a war situation can be abused is not a good and sufficient reason for judicial micromanagement in overseeing of that authority. You have to recognize that in situations were there the government is on a war footing, you have to trust the executive." For Clement, in this case, the Supreme Court was micromanaging the president. Shit, his bio proudly lists that he argued for the indefinite detention of Americans in the Padilla case. Fuck that guy. Fuck him in the ass with a gavel.
Clement was there for all of it. Sure, he was an administration official doing his job, but if he had any qualms, he could have quit. He obviously has no problem with that. He argued the case for banning so-called "partial-birth" abortions. He argued for military tribunals for detainees. As acting AG, he helped assert executive privilege over documents related to the firing of U.S. Attorneys, thus helping the cover-up of that illegal activity. Cheney's energy task force, EPA rules, age discrimination, and on and on, always on the side of evil.
Hell, as a law professor, he supported the Bush v. Gore decision.
So could we just show a little backbone here. And instead of rushing to be all nice and compassionate as he again and again screws over democracy, could we just say, "Yeah, that happened. But you know what? Fuck that guy."
So Bush the Dumber's former Solicitor General, Paul Clement, got hired by congressional Republicans to defend the Defense of Marriage Act, which says, in essence, "Queer love is icky," because the Obama administration finally decided there is some shit they will not eat and refuses to defend it in court. Clement's big-ass law firm, King and Spaulding, under criticism from the Human Rights Campaign and others, decided to cover its financial ass and drop the case. Then Clement quit the firm on principle and took his wubby over to a smaller firm. Then Obama's Attorney General Eric Holder criticized the gay rights groups for criticizing the law firm and said, "Paul Clement is a great lawyer and has done a lot of really great things for this nation." And others are aghast at the way Clement has been treated when all that happened was, after all, free enterprise, supply and demand, man.
Why are Democrats going out of their way to praise Clement? On DOMA and a hundred other things, fuck that guy. Motherfucker was Bush's Solicitor General. That means he signed off on the evil shit that Democrats are supposed to have opposed, including waterboarding. He became acting Attorney General after Alberto Gonzales was whipped out of DC like a rabid pug bitch.
Here's Clement defending power of the president during wartime to the Supreme Court in the 2004 Jose Padilla case: "I think the fact that executive discretion in a war situation can be abused is not a good and sufficient reason for judicial micromanagement in overseeing of that authority. You have to recognize that in situations were there the government is on a war footing, you have to trust the executive." For Clement, in this case, the Supreme Court was micromanaging the president. Shit, his bio proudly lists that he argued for the indefinite detention of Americans in the Padilla case. Fuck that guy. Fuck him in the ass with a gavel.
Clement was there for all of it. Sure, he was an administration official doing his job, but if he had any qualms, he could have quit. He obviously has no problem with that. He argued the case for banning so-called "partial-birth" abortions. He argued for military tribunals for detainees. As acting AG, he helped assert executive privilege over documents related to the firing of U.S. Attorneys, thus helping the cover-up of that illegal activity. Cheney's energy task force, EPA rules, age discrimination, and on and on, always on the side of evil.
Hell, as a law professor, he supported the Bush v. Gore decision.
So could we just show a little backbone here. And instead of rushing to be all nice and compassionate as he again and again screws over democracy, could we just say, "Yeah, that happened. But you know what? Fuck that guy."
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Gitmo Files: We Can Handle the Truth, But We Just Don't Give a Damn About It:
Some day in the near future, in the post-apocalyptic hellscape America that will be left after Republicans refuse to raise the debt ceiling unless President Obama publicly hangs himself from the Lincoln Memorial, when we're all squatting in ditches, foraging around for the food scraps dropped from the sky mansions of the mega-wealthy that hover hundreds of feet above our heads, some European or Asian student, who is writing a thesis about just what the fuck happened to drive a once-near-great nation off the cliff of civilization, will come to a conclusion, one that can be debated and argued over and torn apart, as hypotheses ought to be. She will decide that the most significant marker of eventual American doom was people's adamant refusal to give a shit about what happened to detainees during the long, hopeless war that began in 2001.
Indeed, an engaged, active electorate should have greeted the leak of hundreds of filed on prisoners at Guantanamo Bay with something more than a sigh about having to think about this shit...again, or with a half-hearted scoff at those who would dare leak classified documents. No, one might think that a nation that once worked itself into a frenzy over a president lying about getting his cock sucked in the Oval Office would be able to grip the outrage tube a little harder and squeeze a little smudge of anger out. Alas, it is not to be.
No, there will be no reckonings, great or small, other than the cruel, cruel treatment of Bradley Manning (and if Manning is being treated according to any rules, those rules are fucked and need to be changed) for allegedly daring to break a single law in order to reveal the breaking of many. There will be no arrests of people responsible for the creation or implementation of a system of torture and imprisonment that, at its base, makes hypocrites and fools of every single American citizen.
The documents from Gitmo reveal a level of absurdity in our detention policies that'd make a Catch-22-composing Joseph Heller put down his pen and say, "Fuck it. I can't top that shit." It's amateur hour, and it's been run by people who insist on saying that it's not. Check this out, just one story we can piece together from the files:
There's this former Gitmo prisoner, Mohammed Basardah, a stoner from Yemen who was arrested in Pakistan. He claimed he did the usual shit - trained in camps, fought in Afghanistan. But, and here's where it gets really fucking funny, Basardah decided to just say whatever the fuck his interrogators at Gitmo wanted. Unlike Abu Zubayah, who was tortured like a son of a bitch, Basardah just liked fucking talking, making himself seem bad-ass, giving up names, saying he knew tons of things about al-Qaida and the Taliban. For seven years. Hell, one analyst wrote of Basardah, "The current US government knowledge base of the personnel and activities within Tora Bora would not have been possible without the co-operation and truthfulness of this detainee whose reporting has directly supported US tactical operations in Afghanistan." Yeah, he even told of a London-based al-Qaida cell about which U.S. intelligence created an entire dossier based on his information. In 2008, he was transferred out of Gitmo, sent to Spain, and released. In essence, he said enough to get himself freed.
Now hold onto your sides: motherfucker was lying. Pretty much about everything. Yeah, and other analysts suspected it from the start. "Research into the other detainees' timelines does not readily support [Basardah's] information," they wrote. "In every interview where [Basardah] was questioned on detainee, [Basardah] has changed his story. Detainee's identity as a bodyguard has not been substantiated through other known sources," they warned. So basically, what Basardah did was play his captors. You gotta admire a man for keeping his wits about him in a fucked-up situation. You gotta wonder just why the hell they kept questioning him and why the hell they didn't just let him go to begin with.
And that London sleeper cell? Well, one of the men Basardah said was part of it was 11 years old at the time Basardah said he joined. And others, who had been tracked for years, had never even visited Britain. But, like Curveball later, we just bought his shit. Basardah was a pot dealer in Mecca. You can bet he sold some schwag weed. You can bet that the CIA would have purchased it and pretended they were stoned from tits to toes because of it.
Because Mohammed Basardah said so, there are men being held without charge, men who will never be released, men who were tortured, more than likely. And President Obama continues the detentions, with no more hope than a loaded military commission.
Yet we don't care, as a nation, that any of this is done in our names. We are tired of it and want it to go away. We don't want to make the effort anymore. That's why the new Gitmo files are greeted with a shrug and a turn to whatever stupid shit stupid asshole Donald Trump has said (god, isn't he so stupid?). A decade of a certain action makes that action into the new normal. If it's normal, if it's just the way we do things now, then we don't want to be bothered with changing it. When you beat a populace into apathy, you can get away with, well, murder.
Some day in the near future, in the post-apocalyptic hellscape America that will be left after Republicans refuse to raise the debt ceiling unless President Obama publicly hangs himself from the Lincoln Memorial, when we're all squatting in ditches, foraging around for the food scraps dropped from the sky mansions of the mega-wealthy that hover hundreds of feet above our heads, some European or Asian student, who is writing a thesis about just what the fuck happened to drive a once-near-great nation off the cliff of civilization, will come to a conclusion, one that can be debated and argued over and torn apart, as hypotheses ought to be. She will decide that the most significant marker of eventual American doom was people's adamant refusal to give a shit about what happened to detainees during the long, hopeless war that began in 2001.
Indeed, an engaged, active electorate should have greeted the leak of hundreds of filed on prisoners at Guantanamo Bay with something more than a sigh about having to think about this shit...again, or with a half-hearted scoff at those who would dare leak classified documents. No, one might think that a nation that once worked itself into a frenzy over a president lying about getting his cock sucked in the Oval Office would be able to grip the outrage tube a little harder and squeeze a little smudge of anger out. Alas, it is not to be.
No, there will be no reckonings, great or small, other than the cruel, cruel treatment of Bradley Manning (and if Manning is being treated according to any rules, those rules are fucked and need to be changed) for allegedly daring to break a single law in order to reveal the breaking of many. There will be no arrests of people responsible for the creation or implementation of a system of torture and imprisonment that, at its base, makes hypocrites and fools of every single American citizen.
The documents from Gitmo reveal a level of absurdity in our detention policies that'd make a Catch-22-composing Joseph Heller put down his pen and say, "Fuck it. I can't top that shit." It's amateur hour, and it's been run by people who insist on saying that it's not. Check this out, just one story we can piece together from the files:
There's this former Gitmo prisoner, Mohammed Basardah, a stoner from Yemen who was arrested in Pakistan. He claimed he did the usual shit - trained in camps, fought in Afghanistan. But, and here's where it gets really fucking funny, Basardah decided to just say whatever the fuck his interrogators at Gitmo wanted. Unlike Abu Zubayah, who was tortured like a son of a bitch, Basardah just liked fucking talking, making himself seem bad-ass, giving up names, saying he knew tons of things about al-Qaida and the Taliban. For seven years. Hell, one analyst wrote of Basardah, "The current US government knowledge base of the personnel and activities within Tora Bora would not have been possible without the co-operation and truthfulness of this detainee whose reporting has directly supported US tactical operations in Afghanistan." Yeah, he even told of a London-based al-Qaida cell about which U.S. intelligence created an entire dossier based on his information. In 2008, he was transferred out of Gitmo, sent to Spain, and released. In essence, he said enough to get himself freed.
Now hold onto your sides: motherfucker was lying. Pretty much about everything. Yeah, and other analysts suspected it from the start. "Research into the other detainees' timelines does not readily support [Basardah's] information," they wrote. "In every interview where [Basardah] was questioned on detainee, [Basardah] has changed his story. Detainee's identity as a bodyguard has not been substantiated through other known sources," they warned. So basically, what Basardah did was play his captors. You gotta admire a man for keeping his wits about him in a fucked-up situation. You gotta wonder just why the hell they kept questioning him and why the hell they didn't just let him go to begin with.
And that London sleeper cell? Well, one of the men Basardah said was part of it was 11 years old at the time Basardah said he joined. And others, who had been tracked for years, had never even visited Britain. But, like Curveball later, we just bought his shit. Basardah was a pot dealer in Mecca. You can bet he sold some schwag weed. You can bet that the CIA would have purchased it and pretended they were stoned from tits to toes because of it.
Because Mohammed Basardah said so, there are men being held without charge, men who will never be released, men who were tortured, more than likely. And President Obama continues the detentions, with no more hope than a loaded military commission.
Yet we don't care, as a nation, that any of this is done in our names. We are tired of it and want it to go away. We don't want to make the effort anymore. That's why the new Gitmo files are greeted with a shrug and a turn to whatever stupid shit stupid asshole Donald Trump has said (god, isn't he so stupid?). A decade of a certain action makes that action into the new normal. If it's normal, if it's just the way we do things now, then we don't want to be bothered with changing it. When you beat a populace into apathy, you can get away with, well, murder.
Monday, April 25, 2011
Binyam Mohamed: A Dossier Fragmentation Poem:
(Taken from one of the newly-leaked files of a detainee at Guantanamo Bay. This is from a 2008 assessment of how very dangerous Binyam Mohamed supposedly was. Despite being "high risk," he was released in 2009 to UK custody. He said he was tortured to get his confessions; he was accused by Abu Zubaydah of plotting to explode a dirty bomb. Zubaydah was repeatedly waterboarded in order to get this information.)
"The following section is based on the detainee's
own account. Without consideration of veracity."
"In 1992, [Mohamed] traveled to Maryland and New Jersey with his father."
(Note: he was 14 at the time)
Arrested in Karachi, Pakistan August 9, 2002
"The police transferred him to an investigative center.
During the next two months, investigators were able to determine
[Mohamed's] true identity,
his association with al-Qaida,
and his plan to use a 'dirty bomb'..."
Property held: None
Transferred to Bagram for nearly two years.
Transferred to Gitmo September 19, 2004.
"During an interrogation in 2004, [Mohamed]
admitted guilt on his part and 'wished to bring
his case to a peaceful resolution.'"
"[Mohamed] expressed his desire for martyrdom
while targeting the US and any other opponent
of al-Qaida."
In December 2006, [Mohamed] "said 'Americans are our enemies,
but the law is on our side.'"
[Mohamed] "is assessed to be of HIGH intelligence value." His
last interrogation had been on October 24, 2005, over 3 years before
Rear Admiral D.M. Thomas, Jr. signed the leaked
document.
(The Rude Pundit is in transit; hence, the minimal bloggery. Back tomorrow with full-throated rudiosity.)
(Taken from one of the newly-leaked files of a detainee at Guantanamo Bay. This is from a 2008 assessment of how very dangerous Binyam Mohamed supposedly was. Despite being "high risk," he was released in 2009 to UK custody. He said he was tortured to get his confessions; he was accused by Abu Zubaydah of plotting to explode a dirty bomb. Zubaydah was repeatedly waterboarded in order to get this information.)
"The following section is based on the detainee's
own account. Without consideration of veracity."
"In 1992, [Mohamed] traveled to Maryland and New Jersey with his father."
(Note: he was 14 at the time)
Arrested in Karachi, Pakistan August 9, 2002
"The police transferred him to an investigative center.
During the next two months, investigators were able to determine
[Mohamed's] true identity,
his association with al-Qaida,
and his plan to use a 'dirty bomb'..."
Property held: None
Transferred to Bagram for nearly two years.
Transferred to Gitmo September 19, 2004.
"During an interrogation in 2004, [Mohamed]
admitted guilt on his part and 'wished to bring
his case to a peaceful resolution.'"
"[Mohamed] expressed his desire for martyrdom
while targeting the US and any other opponent
of al-Qaida."
In December 2006, [Mohamed] "said 'Americans are our enemies,
but the law is on our side.'"
[Mohamed] "is assessed to be of HIGH intelligence value." His
last interrogation had been on October 24, 2005, over 3 years before
Rear Admiral D.M. Thomas, Jr. signed the leaked
document.
(The Rude Pundit is in transit; hence, the minimal bloggery. Back tomorrow with full-throated rudiosity.)
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Rude Audio for Easter:
Cheater and the Rude, the Rude Pundit's podcast and online radio gig, from April 14, featuring a commercial for Democrats using the theme from Inception:
And this week's therapy session with Stephanie Miller:
Subscribe, goddamnit, if you haven't already, to the Rude Pundit's podcast (now available on iTunes, too).
Cheater and the Rude, the Rude Pundit's podcast and online radio gig, from April 14, featuring a commercial for Democrats using the theme from Inception:
And this week's therapy session with Stephanie Miller:
Subscribe, goddamnit, if you haven't already, to the Rude Pundit's podcast (now available on iTunes, too).
Friday, April 22, 2011
An Easter Prayer from the Family Research Council:
This week, which most Christians call "Holy Week," but real Christiany Christians call "Passion Week," we members of the Super Duper Prayer Team of the nutzoid evangelical Family Research Council (motto: "Christ died for this?") have been asked to pray because of the sinful activities at the White House's Easter Prayer Breakfast. The Rude Pundit joined the SDPT under a nom de rude some years ago, and every Wednesday he is sent his rusty prayerbone orders for what we gotta drop on our knees for and give Jeezus the high, hard prayin' business.
Now, you might think that the Easter Prayer Breakfast, with 130 religious leaders gathered to dine on ecumenical danishes, is an innocuous event where the President once again shows that, really, he's really, really Christian. But you may as well be sucking the Devils barbed cock while flames burn off your anus hair, you sinning fucker.
Here's how the FRC viewed the event: "Yesterday, President Obama hosted an Easter Prayer Breakfast for 130 clergymen and women in the East Room of the White House. Invited were clergy from Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox traditions, as well as non-traditional groups, among them clergy from homosexual and pro-homosexual denominations, one considered a forerunner in shaping homosexual theology." Yep, it was all about queer-loving. And you know that when Jesus was hanging on that cross in agony, the one thing he was thinking was, "Don't let a black-Muslim-Kenyan president invite the gays to his house to pray to me."
So we on the SDPT are told to "Pray that God will give to us leaders with a Christian worldview, people who know and keep God's eternal laws in public, in private, and in the way they influence public policy." Or it would be simpler to just say, "Pray that God hates fags."
This week, which most Christians call "Holy Week," but real Christiany Christians call "Passion Week," we members of the Super Duper Prayer Team of the nutzoid evangelical Family Research Council (motto: "Christ died for this?") have been asked to pray because of the sinful activities at the White House's Easter Prayer Breakfast. The Rude Pundit joined the SDPT under a nom de rude some years ago, and every Wednesday he is sent his rusty prayerbone orders for what we gotta drop on our knees for and give Jeezus the high, hard prayin' business.
Now, you might think that the Easter Prayer Breakfast, with 130 religious leaders gathered to dine on ecumenical danishes, is an innocuous event where the President once again shows that, really, he's really, really Christian. But you may as well be sucking the Devils barbed cock while flames burn off your anus hair, you sinning fucker.
Here's how the FRC viewed the event: "Yesterday, President Obama hosted an Easter Prayer Breakfast for 130 clergymen and women in the East Room of the White House. Invited were clergy from Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox traditions, as well as non-traditional groups, among them clergy from homosexual and pro-homosexual denominations, one considered a forerunner in shaping homosexual theology." Yep, it was all about queer-loving. And you know that when Jesus was hanging on that cross in agony, the one thing he was thinking was, "Don't let a black-Muslim-Kenyan president invite the gays to his house to pray to me."
So we on the SDPT are told to "Pray that God will give to us leaders with a Christian worldview, people who know and keep God's eternal laws in public, in private, and in the way they influence public policy." Or it would be simpler to just say, "Pray that God hates fags."
Thursday, April 21, 2011
BP Oil Spill One Year Later (Part 4): Two Photos That Tell You What You Need to Know:
There's 12 crosses on the beach at an anniversary vigil at Grand Isle, Louisiana. Eleven of them represent the workers killed when the Deepwater Horizon blew up. The large 12th one in the center is for the Gulf of Mexico. The candles are in old plastic milk containers.
That's a picture from yesterday at a clean-up at Fourchon Beach, Louisiana. Now, a year later, the oil rests just below the surface sand. It's the beach where former BP chief executive Tony Hayward held one of his ill-fated press conferences. Chances are that we won't know for years and years just what the oil did to the Gulf and its coast, but the clean-up continues, even if it's just for cameras on a black gold anniversary.
There's 12 crosses on the beach at an anniversary vigil at Grand Isle, Louisiana. Eleven of them represent the workers killed when the Deepwater Horizon blew up. The large 12th one in the center is for the Gulf of Mexico. The candles are in old plastic milk containers.
That's a picture from yesterday at a clean-up at Fourchon Beach, Louisiana. Now, a year later, the oil rests just below the surface sand. It's the beach where former BP chief executive Tony Hayward held one of his ill-fated press conferences. Chances are that we won't know for years and years just what the oil did to the Gulf and its coast, but the clean-up continues, even if it's just for cameras on a black gold anniversary.
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
BP Oil Spill One Year Later (Part 3): Ways to Celebrate the Anniversary:
We all need to hold hands and sing a song of thanks to our corporate overlords today. The Rude Pundit's got a few ways you can join in the fun of celebrating the day men died, sea life got fucked, and lives got ruined:
1. Strip yourself naked. Pour a bucket of sweet light crude oil over your head. Stand on an American flag. Finger your asshole until you achieve orgasm. Wipe yourself with the flag.
2. Dangle your nuts or a tit over a bear trap. Drop ping-pong balls emblazoned with BP's logo on the bear trap. When someone points out that this is a bad idea, tell them that what you're doing is perfectly safe.
3. Take a shit in the corner of your boyfriend's kitchen. Smear it around when you're cleaning up, toss some bleach on it, and declare it clean. When your boyfriend complains that you still left shit on the floor, tell him that the corner was pretty dirty to begin with.
4. Fill a bathtub with water. Put in one drop of 10W40 and one drop of a chemical dispersant. Ask your best friend if she wants to bathe her baby.
5. Build a tree house out of balsa wood. Invite the neighborhood kids over. Charge them to use it. Step back and watch the fun.
6. Take the shell of a sea turtle that washed up on the shores of Louisiana. Paint sea turtles swimming in a clean ocean on it. Sell it as ironic kitsch.
The Rude Pundit asked Facebookers for their suggestions for a proper celebration, and they tossed up a bunch. Here's a few of 'em:
7. From Stephanie O.D.: "I'll be covering myself with toxic chemicals, claiming that everything's fine, and hugging everyone."
8. From Kymberly L.: "Our sewer pipe is being dug up, yanked out, and replaced with something that doesn't spew filth all over the landscape. How's that for a celebration? BP - watch and learn, you rancid assholes."
9. From Robert E.R.Jr.: "By fueling up my Ford truck and driving nowhere for no reason whatsoever. It's the American Way."
10. From Josh C.: "Probably just contemplating the relative helplessness of even a large group of outraged individuals against a deeply-entrenched, incredibly wealthy corporation that's been in a multi-tentacled, tight embrace with our supposedly representative government for decades. And crying."
And, of course, from Dave A., "With a 'junk shot', baby!"
We all need to hold hands and sing a song of thanks to our corporate overlords today. The Rude Pundit's got a few ways you can join in the fun of celebrating the day men died, sea life got fucked, and lives got ruined:
1. Strip yourself naked. Pour a bucket of sweet light crude oil over your head. Stand on an American flag. Finger your asshole until you achieve orgasm. Wipe yourself with the flag.
2. Dangle your nuts or a tit over a bear trap. Drop ping-pong balls emblazoned with BP's logo on the bear trap. When someone points out that this is a bad idea, tell them that what you're doing is perfectly safe.
3. Take a shit in the corner of your boyfriend's kitchen. Smear it around when you're cleaning up, toss some bleach on it, and declare it clean. When your boyfriend complains that you still left shit on the floor, tell him that the corner was pretty dirty to begin with.
4. Fill a bathtub with water. Put in one drop of 10W40 and one drop of a chemical dispersant. Ask your best friend if she wants to bathe her baby.
5. Build a tree house out of balsa wood. Invite the neighborhood kids over. Charge them to use it. Step back and watch the fun.
6. Take the shell of a sea turtle that washed up on the shores of Louisiana. Paint sea turtles swimming in a clean ocean on it. Sell it as ironic kitsch.
The Rude Pundit asked Facebookers for their suggestions for a proper celebration, and they tossed up a bunch. Here's a few of 'em:
7. From Stephanie O.D.: "I'll be covering myself with toxic chemicals, claiming that everything's fine, and hugging everyone."
8. From Kymberly L.: "Our sewer pipe is being dug up, yanked out, and replaced with something that doesn't spew filth all over the landscape. How's that for a celebration? BP - watch and learn, you rancid assholes."
9. From Robert E.R.Jr.: "By fueling up my Ford truck and driving nowhere for no reason whatsoever. It's the American Way."
10. From Josh C.: "Probably just contemplating the relative helplessness of even a large group of outraged individuals against a deeply-entrenched, incredibly wealthy corporation that's been in a multi-tentacled, tight embrace with our supposedly representative government for decades. And crying."
And, of course, from Dave A., "With a 'junk shot', baby!"
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