Wankers of the Week: A whole new world of wank

Crappy New Year, everyone! How’s your collective hangover? Done barfing yet? Good. Meet the new year, same as the old year…and just as rife with wank:

1. John Fucking Stossel. Yes, Stache-Man John has pride of place in my first weekly wankapedia of this new decade. Why? Well, because even at this shockingly late time in the grand scheme of things, he still hasn’t the foggiest notion of how minimum wage and teen employment (or lack thereof, more to the point) actually interrelate. Stache says low-wage McJobs “used to be a way for kids and the unskilled to get into the labor force, to prove themselves”. Speaking as one who’s had her share (and her fill) of those, I can honestly say they have NOT helped me get anywhere or prove myself at all. All they’ve shown me is how disposable you are when you’re the lowest critter on the totem pole. The younger and less skilled you are, the more disposable you become. You’re not taken in to be nurtured, formed and groomed for a career; far from it. You’re always the last hired, the first fired…and since they weren’t paying that much for the use of your time anyway, there is no incentive for employers to keep you on or help you improve yourself. You end up unknowingly supporting their profits, but their profits do not support you. If you managed to acquire any serious skills, you’d have to be promoted and paid more, and that would eat into the profits. High turnover and low skills are what they’re after. That’s what keeps minimum wage so, well, MINIMAL. That’s how it goes in the real world. But Stache lives in the Randroid cloud-cuckoo land where minimum wage shouldn’t even exist, ideally, because then it would be an incentive of some sort for something. What? I don’t know. In real life, the last time a minimum wage didn’t exist, there was slavery and child labor. And the slavers were bitching about how much those damn uppity niggruhs and ungrateful brats were costing them.

2. Tom Fucking Daniels. He supported Prop H8–and now, it turns out that he’s a child molester? Say it ain’t so. Why do all these homophobes have so many skeletons dancing the Watusi in their closets, anyway? Parents, don’t just keep an eye on your kids–keep an eye on the “respectable” pillars of your community. Especially when they’re around your kids. That is all.

3. Owen Fucking Honors. Of all the spectacularly misnamed people I’ve ever seen, this one might just be this year’s Number One, although it’s a little early to say for certain. But he sure does have one helluva head start. He’s the US navy commander who made homophobic, sexist, seriously unfunny “entertainment” on the public dollar, and then ordered it to be played to a captive shipboard audience. Yes, that’s right–institutionalized homophobia and sexism, with wankery thrown in just for the hell of it. Because hey, it’s not as if there’s any such thing as women in the navy. Or gay sailors. Winston Churchill’s famous dictum notwithstanding.

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4. Julian Fucking Fantino. If you thought that the city of Vaughan sucked before he got his whiny ass elected as its member of Parliament, guess what? Now, it blows! And just where does an authoritarian ex-police chief get off on calling the Liberals Nazis? Either he’s totally unfamiliar with Godwin’s law, or he’s been reading the Doughy Pantload’s shitty book.

5. Judith Fucking Miller. Yes, Steno Judy, the most disreputable NYT reporter of all time, is back in the news. This time, she’s on Julian Assange’s case…for his allegedly doing what we all know she did. Namely, failing to verify. The amusing thing is that the US went to war on the basis of what Steno Judy failed to verify. Assange’s crime? Wanting those wars to end, no doubt. Oh, and did I mention that she jilled off on FUX Snooze…that repository of journalistic integrity?

6. Whoever the fuck is responsible for these shitty greeting cards. You’re not funny, asshole.

7, 8, and 9. Robert Fucking Huber, Adam Fucking Wible and Ian Fucking McHenry. Looks like a douchebag competition in progress. Ladies, if you see any of these men (photos at link; copy, distribute and memorize!), do NOT approach them. And if they approach you, feel free to punch their fucking lights out. They are out to screw you. And whoever finishes with the most “toys”, wins. They got ageism, they got racism, they got xenophobia. They seem to like picking on women who haven’t much going for them in terms of self-esteem. They’re not above date rape when seduction efforts fail (or the woman is just too drunk to say no, or when she’s on a boat). And one of them works for the US State Dept., too. Why do I smell a potential Profumo scandal in the making? (Best comment: “The world is not America’s playground, sexual or otherwise. We should be better people than this.” AMEN.)

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10. Antonin Fucking Scalia. Yup, Fat Tony has said “Vaffanculo” again. This time to women and queers. Perhaps the 14th Amendment, as one of Pam’s commenters said, should not apply to anyone whose surname ends in a vowel, eh?

11. Charles Fucking Adler. You can always turn a radio off; you’re not obligated to listen. You are obligated, however, to sit and listen to whatever a principal says, even if it is as offensive, bland and idiotic as what this dickweed says a principal should say. And what does Chucky say principals should say? Basically, that what you are is nothing, and that acknowledging ethnic and cultural differences (instead of just whiting them out and glossing them over, and pretending that no one is bullied on the basis of them) is “narcissism”. And prating this reactionary bullshit on a radio show billed as “cutting edge talk radio at its very best” is not? Good thing he’s only a stupid, inconsequential radio squawker and not an actual school principal, that’s all I can say.

12. Peter Fucking Kent. From mediocre journalist to sub-par diplomat to shitty Harpocrat cabinet minister, the transformation is now complete. And already the crapaganda is a-flowin’; Peter borrowed from Ezra Fucking Levant’s crappy screed and called the Alberta tar sands’ end product “ethical oil”. Yes, he went there…and has tar all over his nice, shiny shoes to show for it. A pity he couldn’t be more like his brother the Scud Stud, who is still a journalist, and a good one at that.

13. Don Fucking Cherry. He’s a real-life war criminal, and real-life hockey fans are not impressed with his high-priced, taxpayer-financed wank over there in Afghanistan. Yours truly is not a hockey fan in particular, but she likes the game reasonably well when it’s played the way Cherry hates it…namely, when the point of the whole exercise is hockey, not punch-ups. She likes peace even more. That’s why she joined this Facebook group, and urges you to do the same. Let’s all tell ol’ Sour Grapes to STFU, eh?

14. John Fucking Boehner. Yes, it IS pronounced “BONER”. Especially since he broke out the waterworks at his swearing in as Weeper–er, Speaker–of the US House, and named Michelle Fucking Batshit–er, Bachmann–to the intelligence committee. Uh, Boney? Shouldn’t she demonstrate that she HAS intelligence, before being named to anything? Or are you just a man easily bullied?

15. Cornelius Fucking McGillicuddy the Fourth. Or, as the media erroneously knows him, Connie Fucking Mack. Funny how a guy who hangs out with putschist terrorist organizations in Miami wants to put Venezuela on a list of countries harboring terrorists. Shouldn’t “charity” start closer to home, Corny? There are more terrorists in the US than there are anywhere else, including homegrown right-wing nutters and anti-Castro ex-Cubans, yet you won’t list yourselves. Hypocrites! PS: Nice wife you got there, Corn.

16. The Fucking Las Vegas Police Department. Issuing a jaywalking ticket to a girl in a coma? That’s lower than a snake’s ass in a wagon rut.

17. Terry Allen Fucking Lester. Hell hath no fury like…how’s that saying go again? Trust me, it’s worse when a man gets scorned. Worse still when it’s a man with an ugly-ass mullet. You gotta wonder who dates these wankers, and how desperate those poor things must be. Can you believe he was going to send vibrator bombs to THREE of them?

18. Faytene Fucking Kryskow. Wow, this Christ-killer is even crazier than I thought…and that’s pretty damn crazy! She actually claims God is cursing the bloggers (who criticize her, no doubt)? And that any “scribe” who disagrees with her is a “Pharisee”? Dang. Last time I saw a projection that big, I was sitting in an IMAX theatre.

19. Ronald E. Fucking Williams. I bet he’s a hit with the shamefaced, modest, meek Christian ladies. Especially those who, like Sarah “Barracuda” Fucking Palin, played mean basketball back in the day.

20. David Fucking Davies. He doesn’t have a university education, and he’s obviously bitter about it. So bitter, in fact, that he’s now trying, in his capacity as a British parliamentarian, to force others into the same shitty situation that he’s now fortunate to be out of, thanks to his connections. Obviously he knows nothing about what university life is like, if he thinks it’s full of “Mickey Mouse courses” and students who go through the entire four years drunk off their asses. I didn’t see any such courses when I was at university. Perhaps I was in the wrong place? As for being drunk a lot, I couldn’t afford it, nor did I want it; the whole prospect of date rape and other indignities, such as peeing on strangers’ lawns and vomiting in pubs’ stairwells, just somehow didn’t appeal to me, go figure. And this was at a time when Canadian university tuition was still readily affordable. It isn’t now. I don’t see the current crop of more expensively educated grads having any better prospects in life than I had, thanks to the hard right turn the politicians have all taken, and thanks to the fucking the economy has taken as a result of said turn. And yes, I noticed it as soon as I graduated, right into the Great Mulroney Recession–product of Conservative politics and economics. That’s something that the student-haters like Mr. Davies will never understand, much less share with you. Maybe they should have received an affordable university education? Too late now, alas.

21. Scott Fucking Brison. Ignorant about how Colombia really works? Yeah, you could say that. But what do you expect of Scott? He used to be a Tory, and his unfortunate habit of hanging with the oligarchs has yet to be broken. Unfortunately.

And finally, Jared Lee Fucking Loughner. Why?

That’s why. Oh yeah, and he tried to make good on that “conscience dreaming” today with a shooting rampage that’s left at least one person dead, and a popular Democratic congresswoman in hospital fighting for her life. I’d say the video was a wank, but the shooting takes it to the level of criminal threat. This person is deranged, and should have been institutionalized and never allowed to get his hands on a firearm. All you gun nuts and teabaggers out there, this one’s on your hands.

Good night, and get fucked!

http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/federal+environment+minister+calls+oilsands+ethical/4066115/story.html#ixzz1AHWiWK8R
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Festive Left Friday Blogging: Chavecito rings in the new year…

…with yet another show of solidarity…and Bolívar’s sword:

This was at a rally in support of the newly elected PSUV members of parliament. “This sword was asleep, but now it goes once more through the streets of Caracas.”

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Who are the American Taliban?


I’ll give you a broad hint, if the pic above isn’t enough for you. They damn sure aren’t John Walker Lindh:

Teen Challenge by its own definition is an Assemblies of God USA evangelical Christian recovery program and a network of Christian social and evangelizing work centers. It is a 12-18 month program that serves drug addicts, alcoholics gang members, prostitutes, and people dealing with the life controlling problem of same sex attraction and addiction. Think of the program as a sanctification quick stop to redeem one in the eyes of the Assembly of God Church. I was told that once I spoke in tongues that god would work in my life and remove the gay feelings.

In the four months I lived at the teen challenge center in Muskegon Michigan, all personal decisions were left to the director of the center who was guided by a stern handbook that consisted of 111 individual rules and guidelines. A majority of these rules were designed to put program participants in submission to the program’s leaders who supposedly were anointed by God and spoke with the power and authority of the Holy Spirit. The physical evidence of their holiness the ability to speak in speak in tongues.

In the program, we were not ever allowed to look at females directly. Men and women had to sit on separate sides of the chapel and if a woman was singing or giving a testimony she did so behind an office cubical [sic] wall so that only her eyes were visible.

Yep, that last paragraph is the kicker. All that’s missing is the burqa. Women in a deeply inferior position, hidden from view except their eyes…sound familiar? This is what all the burqa-banning shriekers are trying to eradicate from North America and Europe. Or claiming to, at any rate; the fact that they are woman-oppressors in their own right is a thought that I’m sure has never occurred to them. And little wonder; this is the environment they have to work with themselves:

Learning at the center was mostly done through rote memorization. Workbooks for classes had places where critical thinking could potentially take place, but students were expected to just memorize the correct answer and fill it in.

The Taliban, too, are big on rote learning and recitation, and zero critical thinking; their madrassas are all about getting teenage boys chanting certain verses from the Qur’an to stoke the fires of intolerance for the unbelievers, while studiously ignoring those that directly contradict the Taliban’s austere view of the world. Likewise, these fundies are all about “hating the sin” at the expense of having any real concern for the well-being of the “sinner”. Jesus, it should be noted, never said a word about homosexuality–or, indeed, about women being subordinate, come to that.

I wonder if this is what the Coultergeist had in mind when she said “convert them to Christianity”. If so, it’s an epic fail even in the oh-so-Christ-ridden US of A. Gays who are anything but “ex-gay” are leaving programs like this one in droves, and often with psychological damage that takes years of hard work to undo.

As for women, they’ve got the burqa pretty well internalized; no need for veils when this is the mindset they have to struggle with.

But I’m sure that’s never occurred to shrieking harpies like the Coultergeist, who only think they are free, and who are utterly blind to the Taliban-level irony of their trying to force a bogus vision of “freedom” on others.

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Posted in Angry Pacifist Speaks Her Mind, Crapagandarati, Fascism Without Swastikas, Isn't It Ironic?, Pissing Jesus Off, Teh Ghey, The War on Terra | Comments Off on Who are the American Taliban?

Russell Williams, micro and macro

According to the documentary film The Corporation, corporations enjoy the same legal status as actual persons, even though they are nothing of the sort. The film went on to ask the pertinent question: If a corporation is a person, what sort of person is it? And the answer it came up with, after diagnosing the typical activities of large, powerful corporations, was that a typical large, powerful corporation is a psychopath.

That answer, of course, came as no surprise to me. If you’ve worked for corporate bosses for any length of time, however short, you’re apt to feel bullied, harassed, picked on…because you are. And because psychopaths like to do those things. It’s because psychopathy is rewarded in our modern capitalist society–it is regarded as “dynamic” and “leadership-oriented”, rather than harmful and injurious to others and a menace to the environment.

I was reminded of that rather forcefully yesterday, when this crossed my screen:

The same day Russell Williams disposed of the frozen body of the second woman he murdered, the former air force colonel attended a top secret meeting in Toronto arranging security for the G20 summit, where he was to help protect the flights of U.S. President Barrack Obama and other world leaders, the National Post has learned.

The Feb. 3, 2010, meeting of senior military leaders, chaired by Brigadier-General Jean Collin, commander of the armed forces in Ontario, shows the trust Williams maintained before he was unmasked as a deadly sex predator.

His never-revealed high-level role also highlights his unparalleled double life: helping arrange the air movement and protection of the world’s most powerful leaders at the same time his violent sexual behaviour spun out of control.

Williams was among those responsible for planning the air component of the summits, including the arriving and departing dignitaries and protecting the area’s airspace in conjunction with North American Aerospace Defence Command.

“I bet there are a few U.S. Secret Service guys perturbed right now over a serial killer helping plan the president’s movements. By that time in February, he would have known the entire procedure for arrivals and air movement for the summits,” said a military source.

You may be wondering what this has to do with The Corporation. Simple: the G20 summit, while ostensibly a gathering of national leaders, was really all about corporatism and how to make the world “safe” for it.

Human rights take a backseat to the interests of corporations all the time, and G20 governments and their militaries have an active role in making it so. That’s why we saw $2 billion spent on “security” (translation: violent repression of dissent) and the revamping of obsolete wartime laws for purposes nothing like their original ones, and plainclothes police rioting in the guise of “Black Bloc” anarchists while their uniformed brethren stood idly by, even considerately leaving decoy cars out for them to torch, and turning arbitrarily on obviously non-violent, genuine activists instead. Such behavior seems bewildering, until you realize that it is perfectly consistent with one thing only, and that is psychopathy. Our governments, and their militaries, have become handmaidens of the biggest psychopaths in the world. Thus, it stands to reason that they would have hired a Russell Williams–himself a psychopath–to oversee “security” (translation: violent repression of dissent) on just such an occasion.

Of course, Williams has been deemed unfit to operate in society any longer, ostensibly because of his “violent sexual behavior”–which, in fact, is NOT a sexual behavior (as I’ve pointed out, more than once, previously), but sexualized violent behavior. All sexual assaults are forms of assault, not sex. But let’s not kid ourselves: he wasn’t locked away merely because he was a perverted killer. Guys like him get away with it all the time, until by some fluke they are caught: Ted Bundy, Robert Pickton, and the Green River Killer being just a few of the more egregious examples. Russell Williams was deemed unfit to roam free because he got caught, not because he stalked, harassed and killed women.

Behaviors like those of Williams, et al, are actually very well tolerated in our authoritarian capitalist society, and always have been; women’s lives are held cheaper than those of men, and working women of any kind are cherished less than “good” housewives. Moreover, a killer of streetwalkers (such as Pickton) is most likely to get away with it because those ladies are widely seen as human garbage, especially if they’re drug-addicted and/or Native, and the police get tired of having to “clean them up”. So anyone who’s willing to do it and save cops the hassle is likely to be left alone for years, and the murder of “just another hooker” is easily tolerated. As is the theft of underwear from the homes of dozens of women and girls.

What’s not tolerated is the embarrassment of having the perpetrator come to light, because it exposes the pervasive rot in the system. We can’t have people see that the police are more obsessed with cracking innocent protesters’ heads than they are interested in putting real criminals behind bars. So of course a Russell Williams will get shuffled out of sight at the earliest possible opportunity.

Now, since corporations are not actual living breathing persons (albeit perverted ones) like Russell Williams, and since they have a lot more ready cash at their disposal than the former colonel was likely to see in his lifetime, of course, they will get away with bullying, raping and even killing actual living, breathing persons. They will even get away with it when they use military and police uniforms as a front.

As long as the omertà of the “military chain of command” and the “thin blue line” holds, so long will uniformed perpetrators escape justice. Remember, Russell Williams was initially ruled out as a suspect in the rash of break-ins and underwear thefts from nearby women’s houses, precisely because he was a commanding officer at CFB Trenton! The police investigating the break-ins even said, “Well, I guess we don’t have to look at him, then”–because everyone knows there’s a certain “type” that does that, and the uniform is supposed to cancel it out. And let’s not kid ourselves that his violent extracurricular activities were interfering with his performance on the job, either–he was as by-the-book a commanding officer as the Air Force has ever seen!

Heaven forfend that we see the uniform not as cancelling, but concealing such things–both in microcosm (Russell Williams, creeper, killer and thief) and macrocosm (Russell Williams, face of the G20 military-industrial complex).

Heaven forfend, in other words, that we see.

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Posted in Canadian Counterpunch, Cops Behaving Badly, Do As I Say..., Fascism Without Swastikas, Filthy Stinking Rich, Isn't It Ironic?, Isn't That Illegal?, Sick Frickin' Bastards | 1 Comment

Home Improvement, local edition

Hidey ho, good neighbors!

As you can see, we’re live with a new look. It’s WordPress (as opposed to the old Movable Type) and (cough) please excuse the dust if you happen to inhale any. Thanks, and make yourselves at home!

Except for all you trolls, of course. Should you disrespect my right not to be shat upon, you will be seeing a lot of this:

What my new ban page looks like

Thank you, and carry on.

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Let’s play a little game…

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It’s called “Who haz Teh Stoopid about Venezuela?”

Our first contestant: The Miami New Times. In spite of their posing as a liberal alternative paper, they follow all the conventional media lines–and lies–about certain places and presidents. Take, for example, their “Riptide 2.0” report on the bad soap opera of Carlos Andrés Pérez, which came out today, even though I’ve been blogging on this since…oh, LAST YEAR:

Perez, who died of a heart attack at age 88 back on Dec. 25, was first scheduled to be buried in Miami after a mass at St. Thomas the Apostle last Wednesday. But his wife back in Venezuela, Blanca Perez, whom he never divorced, filed a court motion to halt the burial.

Hours later, Matos and his Miami daughters issued a statement seemingly ending the feud, telling El Nuevo Herald they were “not going to challenge” his wife’s move to bury him in Venezuela.

But they’ve apparently had a change of heart. Riptide left messages at Cecilia Matos’ home in Brickell Key and with her lawyer, Juan Antunez, but we haven’t heard back yet.

The AP reports that Matos’ family denies they ever reached an agreement to send him home, telling the service that “this is in the hands of our lawyers now.”

Perez’s embalmed body, meanwhile, is resting in a Miami funeral home until the families — or the courts — sort out the mess.

We know what you’re really wondering. What does Hugo Chavez — who ousted Perez from power in 1992 — think should happen?

Um, Chávez didn’t “oust Pérez from power in 1992”. He led a failed military uprising and went to jail for it. It was the Supreme Court of Venezuela that REMOVED Pérez the following year–for massive embezzlement of public funds, in case you’re wondering. As for Chávez, he wasn’t in the picture again until 1994, when he was pardoned by then-president Rafael Caldera.

You may also be wondering who’s responsible for that piece of belated CAP stoopid. That was one Tim Elfrink. He also calls Venezuela a “Bolivarian paradise”, no doubt with more snark injected into his tone than there is margarine in a Butterball turkey. Tim, thanks for playing. Go stand in the corner. And pick up that dunce cap you see there; it’s for you.

Now, for our next contestant. Andrew Malcolm of the Los Angeles Times characterizes Chavecito as “obstreperous”. Andrew, Andrew, Andrew…you say that like it’s a BAD thing. All it really means is that the man has substantially more backbone than, oh, say, a well-trodden doormat. Nice of you, too, not to note, not even in the name of fairness, that the US ambassador in question, Larry Palmer, has made overt statements before your congress demonstrating his willingness to interfere in Venezuelan politics, which his posting as a diplomat expressly forbids him from doing. And that the Venezuelan ambassador, Bernardo Alvarez, who had spent seven years in the States without a misstep, was “booted” strictly in retaliation for Venezuela’s rejection of the meddlesome (and appallingly ignorant) Mr. Palmer. No, instead, you just dug up that old hambone about how “badly” Chavecito behaved at the UN a few years ago, when he dared to diss Little Georgie Bushie. (That speech got some appreciative laughs, BTW. It was intended to.) Andrew, go join your Miamero buddy Tim there in the corner, and pick up that second dunce cap. It’s all yours, bud.

Our third contestant is FUX Snooze. Using the utterly discredited Andrew Breitbart as your source? That is not only lazy journalism, that’s flat-out crapaganda. Do you even want to bother with the report? I don’t. The quality of the comments tells me all I need to know about the informativity of the piece. Anonymous FUX Snoozer, go to the corner and pick up your dunce cap. It’s marked #3. (You can read numbers, right?)

And finally, the Post and Courier of Charleston, South Carolina. The what? of where?–you say? Yeah, exactly. I don’t know them from a pile of shit either. Which makes their reporting…what? Simple logic, my friends…use it and infer. They’ve devoted a charming piece of fact-free unsigned editorial cowardice to calling two elected leaders “dictators”. This is the same crapaganda I can read every day, anywhere else. It’s easy. TOO easy. Any of you pros ever hear of a thing called JOURNALISM? Here’s a newsflash: YOUR DIPLOMATS LIE. That’s all that Cablegate has revealed so far about Venezuela. Do some serious digging and you might figure that out. And while you’re at it, you might learn the real reasons behind Chavecito’s decree rule; you might be unpleasantly surprised to learn that it actually has to do with catastrophic flooding in the region, not “the lame-duck congress”, which is a strictly US concept and thus inapplicable in Venezuela. The day you send an actual person down there to observe the actual situation and write something other than this boilerplate bullshit, you be sure and alert Google. Until then, you just go pick up dunce cap #4 and sit in the corner with the others.

So, gentle readers: Who do you think should win the Golden Duncecap? Drop a comment in the slot below and let me know who you’d pick, and why.

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Gerry Rafferty has passed

Just learned it from the tweeter. RIP to a great musical hero. Here’s my fave of his:

That singing guitar, so sweet and understated. Perfection.

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Short ‘n’ Stubby: Monday Meow Mix

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Happy Monday, everyone! Ms. Manx hopes your New Year isn’t off to too rocky a start. Here’s some nuggets from the Stumpy Cat’s bowl for all of you today:

Ms Manx is shocked, SHOCKED!–well, not really–to learn that Chris Hedges is a socialist. And that global crapitalism has made him so. She is sure that he’s not the only one. Dave Winer, too, has come out of the commie-pinko closet to assert that the whole world is socialist–like it or not.

Meanwhile, the LAT is awfully squirmy about Dilma Rousseff’s Marxist guerrilla past. What they neglect to mention is why SHE was a socialist (and still is)–Brazil was under a right-wing dictatorship at the time, in which the markets were free and the people were not. Ms. Manx is shocked (but not terribly surprised) that such a significant fact would not be deemed worth mentioning. Indeed, the very fact that Brazil was a dictatorship and that Dilma, their new president, was tortured during it, was buried midway down the piece. It’s a well-known journalistic trick, that, and the Stumpy Cat thinks you should be aware of it–most people read the beginning and end, but only skim the middle.

Ms. Manx is amused, however, to find confirmation that conservatives are cowards. Little wonder, then, that a disproportionate amount of courage exists on the left, which is precisely where all the positive changes in the world are coming from. Dilma was a Marxist guerrilla in Brazil; Pepe Mujica, a former Tupamaro, is now president of Uruguay; and of course, the Stumpy Cat’s favorite guerrilla of all time is Che Guevara, whom no one could accuse of cowardice and still expect to be taken seriously.

And speaking of people whom no one could accuse of cowardice, how about Ted Rall? He’s taken a lot of flak for his cartoons (several of which have appeared here) and his articles, which question the status quo so hard, they’re just shy of waterboarding it. Ms. Manx says “Welcome to the barricades, comrade!”

Finally, Ms. Manx is puzzled by the paucity of female authors in leading literary magazines. And she’s not the only one.

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Music for a Sunday: And you wanted to dance…

I loved these guys during my ’80s teens; I still do, though I think there are other bands from the same era that have stuck with me more. This song and video, though, are just about perfect. The video was shot in Sri Lanka and those aerial views of the temple are to die for.

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Photos du Soir: Seen at Dilma Rousseff’s inauguration

Brazil’s first female president was sworn in today, but the most interesting photos of the day weren’t of Dilma. They were of Hillary Clinton, hesitating over a handshake with you-know-who:

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Doesn’t it look like Juan Manuel Santos (president of Colombia) and Sebastián Piñera (of Chile) are about to say something? Like, “Don’t worry, you won’t catch commie cooties”?

But wait…wait…

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Aha! Grip ‘n’ grin accomplished. See, Hill? That wasn’t so hard after all!

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Posted in Brazil is the Bomb!, Chile Sin Queso, El NarcoPresidente, Huguito Chavecito | 4 Comments