Anybody who thinks living in the desert is boring needs to come and visit when we are having one of our crazy weather weeks, like we are now. It's true during the overwhelming majority of the year our weather is consistent to the point of being boring - for long periods of time we are saddled with blue, cloudless skies, warm-to-hot temperatures and a delightfully dry climate. It's during the summer monsoon season and in the current mid-winter rainy spell when our Chamber-of-Commerce weather takes a hike and we get something completely different.
You need to remember this is a place where even a 30% chance of getting less than a tenth of an inch of rain gets everyone really excited and giddy with anticipation. So when the Rain Gods decide to bestow copious quantities of their liquid blessings on us - presumably to make up for denying us even a trace of precious moisture for as long as 180 consecutive days - it is a big, big deal. The local news media have gone into full-on apocalypse mode and the weather service has been issuing flash-flood warnings every five minutes. The weather people are all over TV predicting a possibility of getting half a year's worth of rain this week alone, and they are fairly squealing with delight and shivering with apprehension at the same time. Good times!
So while we are preoccupied with actually getting wet when we take a step outside, there has been a lot of craziness going on in the real world. The aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti continues to loom large and ugly before the world, as rescue and relief agencies scramble in a desperate attempt to contain the terrible humanitarian disaster. Luckily we are not in the middle of hurricane season, because I could not imagine what would happen if a major hurricane started to bear down on that most unlucky place.
But another earthquake, this one of a political nature, happened on Tuesday when Republican Scott Brown scored an unexpected victory in a race to fill the Senate seat of the late Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts. Such a victory was pretty much ruled out as wildly impossible just a few short weeks ago, when Democrat Martha Coakley had a double-digit lead in the polls which was regarded as insurmountable. So she decided to take an extended Christmas vacation while her opponent tirelessly worked the campaign trail. That may turn out to be the most expensive Christmas vacation ever for the Democrats, because Brown's election shattered the Democrats' sixty-seat supermajority in the Senate, giving the Republicans carte blanche to filibuster everything except the brand of toilet tissue used in the Senate rest rooms.
And filibuster they shall, with Obama's centerpiece health care reform legislation as target numero uno. How incredibly sad for this country that the one, best chance we had at fixing the horrendously broken health care system pivoted on this one election. The Republicans are almost delirious with joy and are making no attempt at all to conceal their glee at this major setback. Not only is losing the seat extremely painful for the Democrats, but particularly galling is the irony that it is Ted Kennedy's seat, who was the main champion of health care reform for most of his career. Blame is being flung far and wide, although most pundits agree that a deeply incompetent, totally mismanaged campaign by Coakley was the main cause of the failure. This is very very bad news for Democrats.
Brown's victory is bad enough, but today it was announced that the Supreme Court ruled that corporations should be able to spend money in political campaigns. Let's review, shall we: Our electoral system is already choked and corrupted beyond measure by corporate lobbyists of all types, and we all realize that's a big problem. So what should we do? Oh, I know, said the Supreme Court: Let's open up the wonderful world of campaign spending to the big corporations and allow them even more latitude to influence and corrupt the elections, large and small, in this country. Freedom of speech issue, said the Supremes. Hey, news flash, you crotchety old farts: People have freedom of speech, corporations don't. What is so hard about that? Corporations aren't people, and they should not be afforded freedom of speech protection. One needs only to view one of the slanted, ridiculous ads for something called "Clean Coal" - a complete contradiction if there ever was one - to get some idea of the heights of idiocy this will lead to.
Had enough depressing news? Let's wallow in a little more, and take a look at the strange case of John Edwards. Former Senator and presidential hopeful, Edwards was regarded as a rising Democratic star with a long, bright future in front of him until he decided to cheat on his cancer-striken wife and have an affair with a filmmaker. When word of the affair was leaked, Edwards got on every media outlet he could and denied, denied and denied some more. When rumors started spreading about him fathering a child with his mistress, Edwards donned the cloak of Righteous Indignation and proclaimed far and wide across the land that the story was utterly and completely free of merit. Today, he backtracked on all that and admitted yes indeed, everything was true. Apparently the upcoming tell-all book by a former campaign aide which will assert that Edwards offered to pay hush money for the rest of his life if he assumed paternity of the child in question (which he did) prompted Edwards to 'fess up to his tacky indiscretion.
I think the part that bothers people, including me, the most is the ease and facility with which Edwards deliberately and with all premeditation lied to the entire country repeatedly by denying something he knew full well had happened. This is why people have no respect for politicians nowadays, because they prove themselves to be compulsive, adroit and inveterate liars over and over again, until they are backed up against the wall and have no choice but to admit their sins. How extremely sad we have people of such dismally low morals in high public places.
And the rain keeps falling outside on the dry dusty desert, from a featureless gray sky, trying but not quite able to wash away our sins.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Friday, January 15, 2010
The Cockroaches Are Out
They say whenever there is a disaster - floods, fires, weather events - that cause destruction on any scale, large or small, loathsome vermin like cockroaches come running out of their hiding places. They come out either to save their own miserable hides or to feast and profit on the misfortune of others. That's what cockroaches do - they lead their lives in the dirt and the filth and the darkness and rejoice when a catastrophe opens an opportunity for them.
We see this happening in lurid, depressing clarity in the aftermath of the Haitian earthquake this past Tuesday. A major disaster in every possible aspect, the suffering and misery is truly epic in scale and can only get worse from this point forward. As with other recent disasters, such as the Indonesian tsunami several years ago or the Hurricane Katrina disaster in New Orleans, the news outlets are overflowing with searing scenes of unimaginable horror, of countless bodies lying in the streets, and of the gravely injured, alone and unattended, waiting for medical assistance that most likely will not arrive in time. The outpouring of sympathy and aid from all corners of the world, from places as diverse as China and Iceland, is also monumental. But still, there are people in this world for whom this cataclysm is merely another chance for publicity and to advance their own agendas.
I am referring specifically to right-wing flab repository Rush Limbaugh and drooling, dementia-addled "man of God" Pat Robertson. Blowhard Limbaugh, the Fort Knox of Ignorance and Stupidity, used his radio program to twist the Haitian crisis into a harangue against the Obama administration for responding too promptly to the event (what a horrible thing to do!). There was also some idiocy which I don't understand involving our income tax being equivalent to foreign aid to Haiti. Excuse me? And to top it off some other blather which implied that the Haitian disaster was an almost tailor-made event for the Obama administration to somehow advance its own agenda. If all this sounds confusing and makes no sense, it's because everything Limbaugh has said regarding this event has been confusing and makes no sense. Just when you think he can't possibly say anything more ignorant and brainless than he already has, he goes and tops himself.
And then there's the desiccated, putty-faced, Howdy-Doody-with-Alzheimers dimwit Pat Robertson, who has come up with some kind of astonishing, mind-blowing drivel about the Haitians forming a pact with the Devil a long time ago to get them out from under French domination. He said directly that all the tribulations and difficulties that benighted nation - the poorest nation in the entire western hemisphere - is due to them agreeing to serve the Devil many years ago. Robertson and his ilk also look down on the Haitian people as being devil-worshipers and voodoo practitioners - which most Haitians are not - although this pseudo-Christian nonsense about a pact with the Devil sounds as much like ignorant, superstitious babbling as does sticking pins in dolls. This latest torrent of insensitive, grossly idiotic hatespeech should prove once and for all that Pat Robertson's brain has completely rotted out, and he needs to be put out of everyone's misery and given a needle to the vein.
They say that horrendous events bring out the best in people, that in every catastrophe which involves massive destruction and loss of life, there are a myriad of unknown, often anonymous acts of courage, selflessness and heroism. Unfortunately in our binary universe, the opposite is also true; disasters bring out the cowardice, hatefulness, evilness and stupidity of people. Anyone who has a shred of intelligence, or compassion for the suffering of innocent people will recognize immediately that Limbaugh and Robertson are shameless examples of the latter, and deserve to be denounced and condemned without mercy, in the strongest possible terms.
We see this happening in lurid, depressing clarity in the aftermath of the Haitian earthquake this past Tuesday. A major disaster in every possible aspect, the suffering and misery is truly epic in scale and can only get worse from this point forward. As with other recent disasters, such as the Indonesian tsunami several years ago or the Hurricane Katrina disaster in New Orleans, the news outlets are overflowing with searing scenes of unimaginable horror, of countless bodies lying in the streets, and of the gravely injured, alone and unattended, waiting for medical assistance that most likely will not arrive in time. The outpouring of sympathy and aid from all corners of the world, from places as diverse as China and Iceland, is also monumental. But still, there are people in this world for whom this cataclysm is merely another chance for publicity and to advance their own agendas.
I am referring specifically to right-wing flab repository Rush Limbaugh and drooling, dementia-addled "man of God" Pat Robertson. Blowhard Limbaugh, the Fort Knox of Ignorance and Stupidity, used his radio program to twist the Haitian crisis into a harangue against the Obama administration for responding too promptly to the event (what a horrible thing to do!). There was also some idiocy which I don't understand involving our income tax being equivalent to foreign aid to Haiti. Excuse me? And to top it off some other blather which implied that the Haitian disaster was an almost tailor-made event for the Obama administration to somehow advance its own agenda. If all this sounds confusing and makes no sense, it's because everything Limbaugh has said regarding this event has been confusing and makes no sense. Just when you think he can't possibly say anything more ignorant and brainless than he already has, he goes and tops himself.
And then there's the desiccated, putty-faced, Howdy-Doody-with-Alzheimers dimwit Pat Robertson, who has come up with some kind of astonishing, mind-blowing drivel about the Haitians forming a pact with the Devil a long time ago to get them out from under French domination. He said directly that all the tribulations and difficulties that benighted nation - the poorest nation in the entire western hemisphere - is due to them agreeing to serve the Devil many years ago. Robertson and his ilk also look down on the Haitian people as being devil-worshipers and voodoo practitioners - which most Haitians are not - although this pseudo-Christian nonsense about a pact with the Devil sounds as much like ignorant, superstitious babbling as does sticking pins in dolls. This latest torrent of insensitive, grossly idiotic hatespeech should prove once and for all that Pat Robertson's brain has completely rotted out, and he needs to be put out of everyone's misery and given a needle to the vein.
They say that horrendous events bring out the best in people, that in every catastrophe which involves massive destruction and loss of life, there are a myriad of unknown, often anonymous acts of courage, selflessness and heroism. Unfortunately in our binary universe, the opposite is also true; disasters bring out the cowardice, hatefulness, evilness and stupidity of people. Anyone who has a shred of intelligence, or compassion for the suffering of innocent people will recognize immediately that Limbaugh and Robertson are shameless examples of the latter, and deserve to be denounced and condemned without mercy, in the strongest possible terms.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
La La La La La La, You Say It's My Birthday
You say it's your birthday
It's my birthday too--yeah
They say it's your birthday
We're gonna have a good time
I'm glad it's your birthday
Happy birthday to you.
-- "Birthday" by the Beatles, from the White Album
The Beatles' song "Birthday" has been echoing in my head all morning, and how appropriate. Because today really is my birthday, number 58 and still counting.
How I ever got to be 58 years old is beyond me, given everything that I've done in the past half-century. For some reason "half-century" sounds like a longer time than "58 years," but whatever. When you're in your twenties, being in your fifties is incomprehensible, so far off in the future. Everyone you knew who were in their fifties seemed older than God's underwear, and it was almost like they were from some other planet. Now, being fifty-plus years old doesn't seem that awful at all.
I look back at my life and I have to say I'm pretty happy with the way things have turned out. I've been extremely fortunate in that I've been able to live my life exactly as I wanted to live it, as opposed to conforming to someone else's idea of what my life should have been like. And like most people I was subjected to a lot of pressure in my early years to conform to a certain societal role. I have been blessed with extremely good health and the skills and talent to make a very comfortable living for myself. I have had the opportunity to live and work in some of the most interesting places in the country, most notably Washington DC in the eighties and the San Francisco Bay Area in the early nineties. I have also been able to visit some of the most fascinating and wonderful places in the world, such as Rio de Janeiro, the United Kingdom, Australia, Iceland, and the Netherlands. There are still many other places I want to visit, but these places are dreams fulfilled for me and they have left their indelible marks on me.
Here are some of my impressions and memories of the decades I have managed to live through, either through sheer luck or by the grace of the Big Dude in the Sky:
The Fifties were all about growing up in a small town, with picture-perfect white Christmases, beautiful Pennsylvania autumns, warm, seemingly-endless summer nights, starting grade school and beginning to explore a huge, wonderful world.
The Sixties were a coming-of-age time, when my life expanded beyond my family and I started to get some idea of my place in the world. I remember the Sixties primarily through music, with the Beatles and Motown in the first half, and the psychedelic music of the hippie era in the second half. The late Sixties were an incredible blast of color, light and excitement, a joyous liberation from the stifling conformity of the previous decade. It was a time when everything was new and exciting and colorful, a time when the world fairly exploded with new possibilities and ideas everywhere, in music, art, literature, entertainment, society. Everything was changing and everything was possible, and it is still probably the most exciting and wonderful time of my life.
The Seventies were a time when reality set in and I had to come to terms with the real world. Like a massive hangover after the wild party that the Sixties were, the Seventies were a time for me to get a grip and get serious about my life and my career. College turned out disastrously for me, and unlike those very fortunate people who have a crystal-clear idea of what they want to do with their lives, I had to flounder around for a while exploring a lot of different things. I did have some very interesting jobs that taught me a lot about the world and about myself, most notably working in the Social Services counseling area of the Allegheny County jail in Pittsburgh. That was probably the most berserk, interesting, frightening and enjoyable job I have ever had in my life. Much of that had to do with my boss at the time, who was one of the funniest people I have ever met. He had an incredible talent for mimicking people, and did uncannily perfect, spot-on impressions of the people we had to deal with in the jail. I remember many afternoons when we laughed ourselves silly for hours. I would laugh so hard and so long my entire body hurt. It was the most ridiculously insane job ever, but also the most fun. The Seventies were like that, completely crazy-scary and interesting all at once.
The Eighties were a huge amount of fun. I was living in Washington DC for the decade, probably the epicenter of everything that was happening in the world at the time. My career was really taking off at the time, being hired by IBM in 1981. I found a lot of wonderful friends who became my chosen family, and we spent the decade in a dizzying haze of dance, dance, dance, drugs, drugs, drugs. DC had its own special kind of R&B/dance music (now known as "old skool") that was exciting, melodic and extremely danceable. We wouldn't get to the dance clubs until 1 A.M. and stayed until well past dawn, stumbling out of the club dripping with sweat into the blindingly brilliant Sunday morning sunlight. And we did that nearly every single weekend! We would travel all over seeking the ultimate in entertainment, and regularly went to New York City, Atlanta, Los Angeles, San Francisco and other places on the party circuit. Now, even thinking about something like that gets me tired. Given the tremendous tsunami of recreational pharmaceuticals with which we were inundated, I truly don't understand how I survived that decade.
The Nineties were the time when I finally grew up and became an adult. Literally, I had been living a very extended adolescence up to that time. You can't do that forever because even the biggest party has to end at some point, and for me that was the nineties. I had a major farewell when I went to Mardi Gras in New Orleans in 1990, and it was five days of the most insane, non-stop partying I had ever done. After that, everything changed. I passed some sort of milestone or had some kind of epiphany, because I left all that craziness behind and somehow, became an adult. My career took me to California in the early nineties and while it didn't turn out to be the utopia I always imagined it to be, I still loved it out there and miss living in California. It was close to being a paradise, but even paradise doesn't last forever. I moved to Phoenix in 1993 and have been here ever since, having finally found a place I can call home. The last half of the Nineties were a time of settling down and stability, and building the basis for the rest of my life.
The Double-Aughts (a really awful name for the first decade of the new millennium) have been a time of transition for me, of really understanding what my life is about and what is important to me. I came to realize that my true calling in life is to work with animals and I came to realize that rabbits are the animals I want to help the most. I discovered Brambley Hedge Rabbit Rescue and the wonderful people there have become my family, the people that I choose to share my life with, and they bring meaning, structure, purpose and best of all joy to my life. As I moved out of the working world into retirement, I've learned to be open and flexible and adaptable to rapidly changing times. Politically and culturally, it has been a scary, violent and at times horrifying ride, fraught with really ignorant and insane people who wear their racism and intolerance like a badge of honor. The past couple of years have been the Ascendancy of Stupidity in America, but I've managed to get through it and I have cautious hope and optimism that this new decade will bring more of the peace, prosperity and happiness I have been so very lucky to have at every point in my life.
It's my birthday too--yeah
They say it's your birthday
We're gonna have a good time
I'm glad it's your birthday
Happy birthday to you.
-- "Birthday" by the Beatles, from the White Album
The Beatles' song "Birthday" has been echoing in my head all morning, and how appropriate. Because today really is my birthday, number 58 and still counting.
How I ever got to be 58 years old is beyond me, given everything that I've done in the past half-century. For some reason "half-century" sounds like a longer time than "58 years," but whatever. When you're in your twenties, being in your fifties is incomprehensible, so far off in the future. Everyone you knew who were in their fifties seemed older than God's underwear, and it was almost like they were from some other planet. Now, being fifty-plus years old doesn't seem that awful at all.
I look back at my life and I have to say I'm pretty happy with the way things have turned out. I've been extremely fortunate in that I've been able to live my life exactly as I wanted to live it, as opposed to conforming to someone else's idea of what my life should have been like. And like most people I was subjected to a lot of pressure in my early years to conform to a certain societal role. I have been blessed with extremely good health and the skills and talent to make a very comfortable living for myself. I have had the opportunity to live and work in some of the most interesting places in the country, most notably Washington DC in the eighties and the San Francisco Bay Area in the early nineties. I have also been able to visit some of the most fascinating and wonderful places in the world, such as Rio de Janeiro, the United Kingdom, Australia, Iceland, and the Netherlands. There are still many other places I want to visit, but these places are dreams fulfilled for me and they have left their indelible marks on me.
Here are some of my impressions and memories of the decades I have managed to live through, either through sheer luck or by the grace of the Big Dude in the Sky:
The Fifties were all about growing up in a small town, with picture-perfect white Christmases, beautiful Pennsylvania autumns, warm, seemingly-endless summer nights, starting grade school and beginning to explore a huge, wonderful world.
The Sixties were a coming-of-age time, when my life expanded beyond my family and I started to get some idea of my place in the world. I remember the Sixties primarily through music, with the Beatles and Motown in the first half, and the psychedelic music of the hippie era in the second half. The late Sixties were an incredible blast of color, light and excitement, a joyous liberation from the stifling conformity of the previous decade. It was a time when everything was new and exciting and colorful, a time when the world fairly exploded with new possibilities and ideas everywhere, in music, art, literature, entertainment, society. Everything was changing and everything was possible, and it is still probably the most exciting and wonderful time of my life.
The Seventies were a time when reality set in and I had to come to terms with the real world. Like a massive hangover after the wild party that the Sixties were, the Seventies were a time for me to get a grip and get serious about my life and my career. College turned out disastrously for me, and unlike those very fortunate people who have a crystal-clear idea of what they want to do with their lives, I had to flounder around for a while exploring a lot of different things. I did have some very interesting jobs that taught me a lot about the world and about myself, most notably working in the Social Services counseling area of the Allegheny County jail in Pittsburgh. That was probably the most berserk, interesting, frightening and enjoyable job I have ever had in my life. Much of that had to do with my boss at the time, who was one of the funniest people I have ever met. He had an incredible talent for mimicking people, and did uncannily perfect, spot-on impressions of the people we had to deal with in the jail. I remember many afternoons when we laughed ourselves silly for hours. I would laugh so hard and so long my entire body hurt. It was the most ridiculously insane job ever, but also the most fun. The Seventies were like that, completely crazy-scary and interesting all at once.
The Eighties were a huge amount of fun. I was living in Washington DC for the decade, probably the epicenter of everything that was happening in the world at the time. My career was really taking off at the time, being hired by IBM in 1981. I found a lot of wonderful friends who became my chosen family, and we spent the decade in a dizzying haze of dance, dance, dance, drugs, drugs, drugs. DC had its own special kind of R&B/dance music (now known as "old skool") that was exciting, melodic and extremely danceable. We wouldn't get to the dance clubs until 1 A.M. and stayed until well past dawn, stumbling out of the club dripping with sweat into the blindingly brilliant Sunday morning sunlight. And we did that nearly every single weekend! We would travel all over seeking the ultimate in entertainment, and regularly went to New York City, Atlanta, Los Angeles, San Francisco and other places on the party circuit. Now, even thinking about something like that gets me tired. Given the tremendous tsunami of recreational pharmaceuticals with which we were inundated, I truly don't understand how I survived that decade.
The Nineties were the time when I finally grew up and became an adult. Literally, I had been living a very extended adolescence up to that time. You can't do that forever because even the biggest party has to end at some point, and for me that was the nineties. I had a major farewell when I went to Mardi Gras in New Orleans in 1990, and it was five days of the most insane, non-stop partying I had ever done. After that, everything changed. I passed some sort of milestone or had some kind of epiphany, because I left all that craziness behind and somehow, became an adult. My career took me to California in the early nineties and while it didn't turn out to be the utopia I always imagined it to be, I still loved it out there and miss living in California. It was close to being a paradise, but even paradise doesn't last forever. I moved to Phoenix in 1993 and have been here ever since, having finally found a place I can call home. The last half of the Nineties were a time of settling down and stability, and building the basis for the rest of my life.
The Double-Aughts (a really awful name for the first decade of the new millennium) have been a time of transition for me, of really understanding what my life is about and what is important to me. I came to realize that my true calling in life is to work with animals and I came to realize that rabbits are the animals I want to help the most. I discovered Brambley Hedge Rabbit Rescue and the wonderful people there have become my family, the people that I choose to share my life with, and they bring meaning, structure, purpose and best of all joy to my life. As I moved out of the working world into retirement, I've learned to be open and flexible and adaptable to rapidly changing times. Politically and culturally, it has been a scary, violent and at times horrifying ride, fraught with really ignorant and insane people who wear their racism and intolerance like a badge of honor. The past couple of years have been the Ascendancy of Stupidity in America, but I've managed to get through it and I have cautious hope and optimism that this new decade will bring more of the peace, prosperity and happiness I have been so very lucky to have at every point in my life.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
The Last Day of The Last Year of the First Decade
Here we are on December 31, 2009. A Thursday night, and from all indications tonight is going to slink away quietly, tail tucked between its legs, as if it were somehow sorry or embarrassed for what had gone on before on its watch.
Yes, we did end the year with a Christmas Day terrorist scare. A Nigerian man got on a Northwest Airlines plane in Schipol Airport, Amsterdam, with explosives in his underwear. I suppose that was only a natural progression from the rectum bomb that nearly took out a Saudi Arabian prince earlier this year, but just how delusional to you have to be to place dangerous chemicals next to your naughty bits? I don't think that this whole suicide bomber thing was properly explained to that dimwit. I mean, if you do blow your junk off, exactly what are you going to do with the 70 virgins that are supposedly waiting for you on the other side? Luckily for everyone, the bomb did not ignite, and amazingly this Al Qaeda group somewhere claimed credit for the failed bombing and even made some boastful comment about building the "sophisticated detonator." Well I guess it was too "sophisticated" to actually "work," better check that out a little more next time.
And there will be a next time, unfortunately. What this failed attempt did show is that the much-ballyhooed post-911 air travel security system has more than a few gaping holes. That Nigerian man should never had had a visa or been allowed to board, there were plenty of indications of his intent. Information was not shared, conclusions were not drawn and preemptive actions were not taken. Next time, we might not be so lucky.
This hasn't been the best of years; so many depressing, disappointing things happened. Sarah Palin refuses to go away, just like the worst case of irritable bowel syndrome you could imagine. So many people who should know better just continue to say and do the most outrageously stupid, destructive and embarrassing things possible. Dick Cheney continues to be one of the scariest and most evil people who used to be alive. Like they say, the good die young but evil is forever. If Cheney had his way the nuclear bombs would be falling from the sky like raindrops in Seattle and he would be King of Necrotopia forever.
Did anything good at all happen this year? I suppose we can say the fact that we made it through this year and are still around to gripe and moan about it is something good. But this has been a very difficult year to get through for a lot of people, including me. The job situation is still horrendously bad, with unemployment at 10%. Property values are still in the toilet, foreclosures still raging. The U.S. economy is showing some meager signs of recovery but is still very, very sick, and can relapse at any time. Greed and avarice continue unabated. There have been a number of news stories indicating that year-end bonuses on Wall Street are going to be as outrageous as ever, almost as if the financial meltdown earlier this year was just an unpleasant fever dream, the kind you get from eating tainted lobster or bad caviar or something.
This year more than ever, stupidity reigned in this country. Whether it was the "balloon boy" supposedly drifting across the Colorado landscape in a silver spaceship, or former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich doing and saying the dumbest things he could possibly think of, or Kanye West creating a cultural firestorm by stomping all over Taylor Swift's first American Music Award, or boring Barbie doll Carrie Prejean posing as some conservative Christian pillar of morality passing judgment on the marital arrangements of others while sitting on a homemade sex tape, it does seem like the idiots are really taking over this country. But there were little touches of welcome relief, such as Susan Boyle's stunning debut on a British talent show, when a studio audience (and later the world) morphed from cynical derision to enraptured adoration in the time it took her to sing the words, "I dreamed a dream of times gone by...." or the surprising success of Lady Gaga, who is a fairly good singer and musician once you get past all the junior-college-art-class costumes and posturing. She seems like what would happen if Icelandic pop star Bjork dyed her hair platinum blonde and got a hold of some bad drugs.
I may or may not be awake when the clock strikes midnight tonight. If I am I'm sure I'll be serenaded by the sound of automatic weapons fire coming from the cheap apartment complexes to the south of me. Just another indication that in spite of all my deepest, most sincere wishes and prayers, we will still have to deal with stupid people next year. Is there any hope for 2010 to be any better than 2009? It's so hard to judge at this point. I remember on January 1, 2009, no one was holding out any hope that the year would be any good. And it certainly lived down to our expectations. Maybe we should try the opposite approach, and start thinking good thoughts about 2010. Perhaps if we do things will work out and the year will return prosperity, security and hope to everyone. I wish that does happen, but just in case, I'm going to start working on Plan B tomorrow.
Yes, we did end the year with a Christmas Day terrorist scare. A Nigerian man got on a Northwest Airlines plane in Schipol Airport, Amsterdam, with explosives in his underwear. I suppose that was only a natural progression from the rectum bomb that nearly took out a Saudi Arabian prince earlier this year, but just how delusional to you have to be to place dangerous chemicals next to your naughty bits? I don't think that this whole suicide bomber thing was properly explained to that dimwit. I mean, if you do blow your junk off, exactly what are you going to do with the 70 virgins that are supposedly waiting for you on the other side? Luckily for everyone, the bomb did not ignite, and amazingly this Al Qaeda group somewhere claimed credit for the failed bombing and even made some boastful comment about building the "sophisticated detonator." Well I guess it was too "sophisticated" to actually "work," better check that out a little more next time.
And there will be a next time, unfortunately. What this failed attempt did show is that the much-ballyhooed post-911 air travel security system has more than a few gaping holes. That Nigerian man should never had had a visa or been allowed to board, there were plenty of indications of his intent. Information was not shared, conclusions were not drawn and preemptive actions were not taken. Next time, we might not be so lucky.
This hasn't been the best of years; so many depressing, disappointing things happened. Sarah Palin refuses to go away, just like the worst case of irritable bowel syndrome you could imagine. So many people who should know better just continue to say and do the most outrageously stupid, destructive and embarrassing things possible. Dick Cheney continues to be one of the scariest and most evil people who used to be alive. Like they say, the good die young but evil is forever. If Cheney had his way the nuclear bombs would be falling from the sky like raindrops in Seattle and he would be King of Necrotopia forever.
Did anything good at all happen this year? I suppose we can say the fact that we made it through this year and are still around to gripe and moan about it is something good. But this has been a very difficult year to get through for a lot of people, including me. The job situation is still horrendously bad, with unemployment at 10%. Property values are still in the toilet, foreclosures still raging. The U.S. economy is showing some meager signs of recovery but is still very, very sick, and can relapse at any time. Greed and avarice continue unabated. There have been a number of news stories indicating that year-end bonuses on Wall Street are going to be as outrageous as ever, almost as if the financial meltdown earlier this year was just an unpleasant fever dream, the kind you get from eating tainted lobster or bad caviar or something.
This year more than ever, stupidity reigned in this country. Whether it was the "balloon boy" supposedly drifting across the Colorado landscape in a silver spaceship, or former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich doing and saying the dumbest things he could possibly think of, or Kanye West creating a cultural firestorm by stomping all over Taylor Swift's first American Music Award, or boring Barbie doll Carrie Prejean posing as some conservative Christian pillar of morality passing judgment on the marital arrangements of others while sitting on a homemade sex tape, it does seem like the idiots are really taking over this country. But there were little touches of welcome relief, such as Susan Boyle's stunning debut on a British talent show, when a studio audience (and later the world) morphed from cynical derision to enraptured adoration in the time it took her to sing the words, "I dreamed a dream of times gone by...." or the surprising success of Lady Gaga, who is a fairly good singer and musician once you get past all the junior-college-art-class costumes and posturing. She seems like what would happen if Icelandic pop star Bjork dyed her hair platinum blonde and got a hold of some bad drugs.
I may or may not be awake when the clock strikes midnight tonight. If I am I'm sure I'll be serenaded by the sound of automatic weapons fire coming from the cheap apartment complexes to the south of me. Just another indication that in spite of all my deepest, most sincere wishes and prayers, we will still have to deal with stupid people next year. Is there any hope for 2010 to be any better than 2009? It's so hard to judge at this point. I remember on January 1, 2009, no one was holding out any hope that the year would be any good. And it certainly lived down to our expectations. Maybe we should try the opposite approach, and start thinking good thoughts about 2010. Perhaps if we do things will work out and the year will return prosperity, security and hope to everyone. I wish that does happen, but just in case, I'm going to start working on Plan B tomorrow.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Worst-of List for 2009 (Part 2)
Whereas I get personal and start to name names. There is so much material here, but I promise there will not be a Worst-of List, Part 3.
Asshole of the Year: Sarah Palin
Whether it's ridiculous, preposterous concepts such as "death panels" bubbling up from the depths of her rancid little cesspool of a mind, or her baffling bail-out from the governorship of her state, or her eternally annoying bleating every time she gets in front of a microphone, Sarah Palin continues to inexplicably occupy a prominent place on the political/pop culture scene far out of proportion to any actual value her life has. Her very existence is depressing enough, but what it also shows us is the huge number of incredibly stupid, ignorant people in this nation who think that she is "speaking for them." They seem to have the impression that Palin is "real" but don't realize that every single word that comes out of her mouth and everything she does is scripted down to the finest detail by her conservative puppet-masters/handlers in the Republican party. Sarah Palin is the ultimate phony, a ventriloquist dummy with schoolteacher glasses who probably has never had a single coherent thought of her own in her whole life. Stupid people attract other stupid people, a sad fact of life that happens everywhere she goes. How pathetic for this country.
Asshole of the Decade: George W. Bush
There truly aren't enough bad things in the English language to say about George W. Bush, so I'm not even going to waste (much) space rehashing them. The eight long horrible years of his two presidential terms were truly a Dark Age of American politics. On September 11, 2001, as the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York (and, by extension, the American way of life we all grew up with) crumbled, Bush sat in a classroom, paralyzed by his own stupidity, reading a story to a group of children. He completely fabricated the assertion that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and used it to get the U.S. in a bloody quagmire of a war, for which we will be paying all manner of consequences for generations. He continually and consistently changed the tax structure to benefit the super-wealthy. Early on he established himself as a very hands-off, detached president who regarded his duties in the Oval Office as a petty annoyance he had to deal with between vacations. He used every opportunity to blur the separation of church and state, and allowed every corporate special-interest and lobbying group to have unfettered access to the highest levels of government. But as horrible and loathsome as Bush is, the American voter deserves the lion's share of blame for the galaxy-class abomination that was President George W. Bush. They voted him into office twice, and they deserve every awful thing that happens to this country in the future. Trouble is, the rest of us who voted against this empty-headed simpleton have to pay for it, too.
Runner-up: Dick Cheney (Veep of the Living Dead)
Worst Political Pundit: Bill O'Reilly
Loud, shrill, bullying, ignorant, duplicitous, venal, mean-spirited, lying, blustering, obnoxious, cowardly, hypocritical. And these are his good qualities. Did I also mention batshit-crazy?
Runners-Up: Sean Hannity, just about anyone on the Fox Noise Channel
Most Loathsome Politician: Joe Lieberman
There is something so incredibly despicable, smarmy and disgusting about Lieberman, senator from Connecticut. Sure there are plenty of vile Republican members of Congress who deserve to be despised, but at least they wear their disgustingness out in the open. Formerly a Democrat, Lieberman decided to go Independent when it looked like he was going to lose a primary election, and has been skipping over to the Republican side of the political fence regularly, as circumstances suit him. Either he is a brilliant political tactician expertly playing both sides against the other, or he is the ultimate hypocrite, crassly doing whatever he needs to do to get people to pay attention to him. It is truly symptomatic of how corrupt and broken our political system is that he was afforded such power in the recent health care debate. Every second that he is alive is a second squandered.
Runners-Up: Michelle Bachmann, Orrin Hatch, Mitch McConnell, Mitt Romney, Mick Huckabee, oh God, it just goes on and on
Most Loathsome Person of the Decade, and maybe on Earth: Rush Limbaugh
Part ultra-obnoxious grade-school bully, part Jabba the Hutt in a cheap suit, this gigantic, quivering mass of flab bloviates for hours a day, spreading toxic political flatulence far and wide with his radio program. His inexplicably vast audience, who call themselves "dittoheads," - apparently without a hint of understanding the irony - willingly accept and believe every fetid dollop of idiocy this bloated, drug-addicted puddle of goo spoon-feeds them. Everyday, in many ways, he makes America stupider and stupider.
Runners-Up: Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, Gary Bauer, at least 100 members of Congress
Best Impression of a Meteorite: Tiger Woods
A meteorite is something that falls from a great height, blazes out in brilliant self-destruction and crashes to earth. That pretty much describes Tiger Woods, who must be hating life a lot right now. Let's review: here is a guy who seeming had everything: universally acknowledged as the greatest golfer who ever lived, extremely lucrative endorsement deals, multimillion-dollar home and yacht, worldwide fame, a gorgeous Swedish wife and two cute dogs. Also a couple of kids, but whatever. So what do you do when you have all that? Take a lot of Ambien and have hazy, druggy sex with a smorgasbord of "noctural hospitality hostesses", a.k.a. Las Vegas skanks. Huh??? WTF, seriously? Can he possibly be that stupid? He has it all but is still not satisfied. He deserves everything that happens to him and I hope Elin bleeds him dry.
Most Awful Occurrence of the Year: Nothing yet, but there are still 8 days to go. After all, a monstrous tsunami or earthquake can always occur with no warning.
Most Awful Occurrence of the Decade: September 11, 2001
The date that is burned on all of our memories, the day that the life of every American, and in fact the lives of everyone in the world, changed irreversibly. Eight years past, the horror of the day is still pretty much undiminished and unresolved. We've come to expect long lines at airports, removing our shoes to be searched for explosives, and the uncomfortable thought that is always in the back of everyone's minds: when will the next terrorism event happen? Even the "good old days" of the 1990's seem like a world away. In fact they are, and the world we live in now is a much more dangerous place.
Douchebag of the Year: Jon Gosselin
The male half of the Parenting Team of the Year on the inexplicably popular reality show Jon and Kate Plus Eight always seemed to be portrayed as a pudgy, dimwitted doormat, regularly emasculated by his vicious harpy of a wife in front of the children and an audience of millions. Somewhere along the line he sort of got a clue and bailed on the show and his family. Once free of the stifling, abusive tyranny of his marriage, Gosselin went wild and was spotted at every dubious party and media event he could possibly cram into his calendar, while Kate stayed at home sharpening her hair and making other people shovel out tons of soiled diapers. The fact that he was photographed unabashedly slobbering over a series of disgusting, classless media whores only served to make his snarling wife look like the victim. If anyone makes an allegation of how gay marriage would destroy and debase the institution of matrimony in this country, they need only be directed to the Gosselins as the true source of disrespect and debasement.
Douchebag of the Decade: Girls Gone Wild producer Joe Francis
Here we have American capitalism at its finest - an "entrepreneur" who builds a hugely profitable empire on videotaping drunk, moronic college girls cavorting around with no tops. That's it - no subtlety involved here. Whores and skanks with their boobies flopping around. I've never seen a GGW video and make all possible efforts to avoid them, but wouldn't that get really boring after about two minutes? Anyhow, Francis has the spongy, round face everyone would love to punch and a Pillsbury doughboy body that just begs for a good butt-kicking. I guess the last I heard of him he was in jail for something, where he probably will never get to see who his cellmate is since he will always be facing the other direction.
Stupidest People of the Year: Birthers and Teabaggers
Barack Obama's election and inauguration as the first African-American president so shocked and angered lots of (racist) voters in this country that for a while they were stunned into mute disbelief. They woke up and got their bearings midyear, going batshit crazy with some wild conspiracy theory that Obama wasn't an American citizen and therefore could not be President. It didn't matter one whit that all their claims and forged documents were universally, categorically and affirmatively refuted - they were sure they were right. And a lot of them still believe they are as they and their "movement" mercifully fade into the background noise of idiocy that makes up a lot of the socio-political climate of this country. The teabaggers were on display everywhere this summer, from throwing tantrums at town-hall meetings to lugging around hilariously misspelled or misconceived signs at the "Voter Values Summit" in Washington, of which my favorite was the "Keep Your Government Hands Off My Medicare" sign brandished by a senior citizen. And anyone who is aware of the "other meaning" of the term "teabagging" found it difficult to not laugh and gag at the same time when someone reported on television that "senior citizens were teabagging on the streets of Washington."
Runners-Up: "Intelligent Design" advocates
Stupidest People of the Decade: Republicans
Republicans are always on either the stupid side of major issues (global warming, evolution, health care, financial reform, foreign policy, tax reform) or the evil, hateful side of major issues (gay marriage, church/state separation, clean air/water issues, abortion, coal/oil policies, etc., etc.). They claim to be in the "party of Lincoln" but Old Abe is spinning in his grave like a runaway food blender every single time one of them opens their mouth. Republicans have forged an unholy, vile and extremely cynical alliance with the fundamentalists and they, despite all their claims to being "Christian," continue to spread racism, homophobia and discrimination far and wide across the world. As far as I'm concerned, there is absolutely nothing of any merit or value in the Republican party AT ALL and I could not disagree with them more vehemently on nearly everything.
That's it, I'm done. Please, 2010, do better than this past year.
Asshole of the Year: Sarah Palin
Whether it's ridiculous, preposterous concepts such as "death panels" bubbling up from the depths of her rancid little cesspool of a mind, or her baffling bail-out from the governorship of her state, or her eternally annoying bleating every time she gets in front of a microphone, Sarah Palin continues to inexplicably occupy a prominent place on the political/pop culture scene far out of proportion to any actual value her life has. Her very existence is depressing enough, but what it also shows us is the huge number of incredibly stupid, ignorant people in this nation who think that she is "speaking for them." They seem to have the impression that Palin is "real" but don't realize that every single word that comes out of her mouth and everything she does is scripted down to the finest detail by her conservative puppet-masters/handlers in the Republican party. Sarah Palin is the ultimate phony, a ventriloquist dummy with schoolteacher glasses who probably has never had a single coherent thought of her own in her whole life. Stupid people attract other stupid people, a sad fact of life that happens everywhere she goes. How pathetic for this country.
Asshole of the Decade: George W. Bush
There truly aren't enough bad things in the English language to say about George W. Bush, so I'm not even going to waste (much) space rehashing them. The eight long horrible years of his two presidential terms were truly a Dark Age of American politics. On September 11, 2001, as the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York (and, by extension, the American way of life we all grew up with) crumbled, Bush sat in a classroom, paralyzed by his own stupidity, reading a story to a group of children. He completely fabricated the assertion that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and used it to get the U.S. in a bloody quagmire of a war, for which we will be paying all manner of consequences for generations. He continually and consistently changed the tax structure to benefit the super-wealthy. Early on he established himself as a very hands-off, detached president who regarded his duties in the Oval Office as a petty annoyance he had to deal with between vacations. He used every opportunity to blur the separation of church and state, and allowed every corporate special-interest and lobbying group to have unfettered access to the highest levels of government. But as horrible and loathsome as Bush is, the American voter deserves the lion's share of blame for the galaxy-class abomination that was President George W. Bush. They voted him into office twice, and they deserve every awful thing that happens to this country in the future. Trouble is, the rest of us who voted against this empty-headed simpleton have to pay for it, too.
Runner-up: Dick Cheney (Veep of the Living Dead)
Worst Political Pundit: Bill O'Reilly
Loud, shrill, bullying, ignorant, duplicitous, venal, mean-spirited, lying, blustering, obnoxious, cowardly, hypocritical. And these are his good qualities. Did I also mention batshit-crazy?
Runners-Up: Sean Hannity, just about anyone on the Fox Noise Channel
Most Loathsome Politician: Joe Lieberman
There is something so incredibly despicable, smarmy and disgusting about Lieberman, senator from Connecticut. Sure there are plenty of vile Republican members of Congress who deserve to be despised, but at least they wear their disgustingness out in the open. Formerly a Democrat, Lieberman decided to go Independent when it looked like he was going to lose a primary election, and has been skipping over to the Republican side of the political fence regularly, as circumstances suit him. Either he is a brilliant political tactician expertly playing both sides against the other, or he is the ultimate hypocrite, crassly doing whatever he needs to do to get people to pay attention to him. It is truly symptomatic of how corrupt and broken our political system is that he was afforded such power in the recent health care debate. Every second that he is alive is a second squandered.
Runners-Up: Michelle Bachmann, Orrin Hatch, Mitch McConnell, Mitt Romney, Mick Huckabee, oh God, it just goes on and on
Most Loathsome Person of the Decade, and maybe on Earth: Rush Limbaugh
Part ultra-obnoxious grade-school bully, part Jabba the Hutt in a cheap suit, this gigantic, quivering mass of flab bloviates for hours a day, spreading toxic political flatulence far and wide with his radio program. His inexplicably vast audience, who call themselves "dittoheads," - apparently without a hint of understanding the irony - willingly accept and believe every fetid dollop of idiocy this bloated, drug-addicted puddle of goo spoon-feeds them. Everyday, in many ways, he makes America stupider and stupider.
Runners-Up: Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, Gary Bauer, at least 100 members of Congress
Best Impression of a Meteorite: Tiger Woods
A meteorite is something that falls from a great height, blazes out in brilliant self-destruction and crashes to earth. That pretty much describes Tiger Woods, who must be hating life a lot right now. Let's review: here is a guy who seeming had everything: universally acknowledged as the greatest golfer who ever lived, extremely lucrative endorsement deals, multimillion-dollar home and yacht, worldwide fame, a gorgeous Swedish wife and two cute dogs. Also a couple of kids, but whatever. So what do you do when you have all that? Take a lot of Ambien and have hazy, druggy sex with a smorgasbord of "noctural hospitality hostesses", a.k.a. Las Vegas skanks. Huh??? WTF, seriously? Can he possibly be that stupid? He has it all but is still not satisfied. He deserves everything that happens to him and I hope Elin bleeds him dry.
Most Awful Occurrence of the Year: Nothing yet, but there are still 8 days to go. After all, a monstrous tsunami or earthquake can always occur with no warning.
Most Awful Occurrence of the Decade: September 11, 2001
The date that is burned on all of our memories, the day that the life of every American, and in fact the lives of everyone in the world, changed irreversibly. Eight years past, the horror of the day is still pretty much undiminished and unresolved. We've come to expect long lines at airports, removing our shoes to be searched for explosives, and the uncomfortable thought that is always in the back of everyone's minds: when will the next terrorism event happen? Even the "good old days" of the 1990's seem like a world away. In fact they are, and the world we live in now is a much more dangerous place.
Douchebag of the Year: Jon Gosselin
The male half of the Parenting Team of the Year on the inexplicably popular reality show Jon and Kate Plus Eight always seemed to be portrayed as a pudgy, dimwitted doormat, regularly emasculated by his vicious harpy of a wife in front of the children and an audience of millions. Somewhere along the line he sort of got a clue and bailed on the show and his family. Once free of the stifling, abusive tyranny of his marriage, Gosselin went wild and was spotted at every dubious party and media event he could possibly cram into his calendar, while Kate stayed at home sharpening her hair and making other people shovel out tons of soiled diapers. The fact that he was photographed unabashedly slobbering over a series of disgusting, classless media whores only served to make his snarling wife look like the victim. If anyone makes an allegation of how gay marriage would destroy and debase the institution of matrimony in this country, they need only be directed to the Gosselins as the true source of disrespect and debasement.
Douchebag of the Decade: Girls Gone Wild producer Joe Francis
Here we have American capitalism at its finest - an "entrepreneur" who builds a hugely profitable empire on videotaping drunk, moronic college girls cavorting around with no tops. That's it - no subtlety involved here. Whores and skanks with their boobies flopping around. I've never seen a GGW video and make all possible efforts to avoid them, but wouldn't that get really boring after about two minutes? Anyhow, Francis has the spongy, round face everyone would love to punch and a Pillsbury doughboy body that just begs for a good butt-kicking. I guess the last I heard of him he was in jail for something, where he probably will never get to see who his cellmate is since he will always be facing the other direction.
Stupidest People of the Year: Birthers and Teabaggers
Barack Obama's election and inauguration as the first African-American president so shocked and angered lots of (racist) voters in this country that for a while they were stunned into mute disbelief. They woke up and got their bearings midyear, going batshit crazy with some wild conspiracy theory that Obama wasn't an American citizen and therefore could not be President. It didn't matter one whit that all their claims and forged documents were universally, categorically and affirmatively refuted - they were sure they were right. And a lot of them still believe they are as they and their "movement" mercifully fade into the background noise of idiocy that makes up a lot of the socio-political climate of this country. The teabaggers were on display everywhere this summer, from throwing tantrums at town-hall meetings to lugging around hilariously misspelled or misconceived signs at the "Voter Values Summit" in Washington, of which my favorite was the "Keep Your Government Hands Off My Medicare" sign brandished by a senior citizen. And anyone who is aware of the "other meaning" of the term "teabagging" found it difficult to not laugh and gag at the same time when someone reported on television that "senior citizens were teabagging on the streets of Washington."
Runners-Up: "Intelligent Design" advocates
Stupidest People of the Decade: Republicans
Republicans are always on either the stupid side of major issues (global warming, evolution, health care, financial reform, foreign policy, tax reform) or the evil, hateful side of major issues (gay marriage, church/state separation, clean air/water issues, abortion, coal/oil policies, etc., etc.). They claim to be in the "party of Lincoln" but Old Abe is spinning in his grave like a runaway food blender every single time one of them opens their mouth. Republicans have forged an unholy, vile and extremely cynical alliance with the fundamentalists and they, despite all their claims to being "Christian," continue to spread racism, homophobia and discrimination far and wide across the world. As far as I'm concerned, there is absolutely nothing of any merit or value in the Republican party AT ALL and I could not disagree with them more vehemently on nearly everything.
That's it, I'm done. Please, 2010, do better than this past year.
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Worst-Of List for 2009 (Part 1)
My previous list, the Best of 2009, was fun to write but it was kind of difficult to come up with. The Worst of 2009 List, on the other hand, practically wrote itself in an embarrassment-of-riches kind of way. There was absolutely no shortage of stupidity, awful behavior and downright lunacy in this past year, and the following barely scratches the surface:
Most Annoying Social Trend: Tweeting/Texting/Sexting
There seems to be a concerted effort to make the spoken word obsolete, as if it's too much trouble to deal with or something. Concurrently, there seems to be a real appetite for taking the minute details of one's everyday existence and throwing them up on a global stage for everyone to see. This is narcissism and self-absorption on a level never before witnessed in history. The question is, why? I never imagined typing could be easier than just speaking but apparently it is, given the popularity of texting and tweeting. I have seen people sitting in adjacent rooms texting each other, because presumably getting up and walking to the next room to tell someone something is now considered gauche. And sexting - sending revealing/obscene pictures of yourself via cellphone - how insane is that? Once those pics get released into cyberspace they live forever and can gain a world-wide audience faster than you can sneeze. Get a grip, kids.
Dumbest Socio-Political Trend: Can't Keep It In Your Pants
Just what is it with male public figures that cause them to screw up in the most ridiculous, embarrassing way possible - getting caught with their pants down in tawdry sex scandals? Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina told his staff he was going hiking in the Appalachians when he was really skipping down to Argentina to canoodle with his alleged soul-mate. Creepy one-time presidential candidate John Edwards gave up his political aspirations along with any shred of dignity he might have had by messing around with a female videographer. Sen. John Ensign (R-NV) was busted doing something icky with a woman and his family tried to pay her hush money to keep her yap shut. Luckily, she didn't. The list goes on and on. Why do these repulsive old farts think they can play around like they're eighteen years old or something? Unfortunately there is no shortage of morality-free skanks for whom public whoring is an amusing pastime, and the combination of the two means that there will be many more stomach-churning hookups to endure for the foreseeable future.
Worst TV show of the Year: Jersey Shore
This is a very late entry into the tsunami of drivel that regularly pours out of our sets, but it has rocketed to the front of the pack and left everything else far behind in its odoriferous wake. Jersey Shore is part reality show/part weird, post-apocalyptic minstrel show which chronicles the astonishingly pointless and completely delusional lives of a group of twenty-somethings inhabiting a vacation house in Seaside Heights, New Jersey. They spend their days scantily clad bickering like mildly retarded six-year-olds and dealing with manufactured crises like running out of hair gel, and their nights trolling from night club to sleazy night club getting drunk and grinding up against one another. Referring to themselves as "guidos" and "guidettes" (which makes me really unhappy because my last name is "Guida" and I'm constantly being mistaken for Italian even though I'm Polish) they have drawn the ire of Italian-American groups who are rightfully embarrassed by their stereotypical buffoonery, but in truth anyone who claims to be a member of the human race should be profoundly mortified by their swinish, completely classless lives. America in particular and the world in general has reason to be deeply worried should any of these dimwitted pinheads start reproducing.
BONUS! Worst Show of the Decade: American Idol
AI has been around for, oh I don't know, fifty or sixty years now. Maybe it only seems that way, but what started out as an innocuous, rather unimaginative talent contest has metastasized into a cultural phenomenon, commanding stratospheric television ratings and becoming the centerpiece of the Fox TV network schedule (irony intended). Every year it's the same thing - the audition shows where severely mentally disturbed people display their total lack of talent to a nationwide audience and then lose their shit in a very public way when the truth hits them like getting smacked in the face with a dead fish. It's actually more than a little upsetting when they show you one of their "pity cases," someone who is trapped in a very bleak, dead-end life and is betting everything on this show turning them into a star when there is no chance in hell of that ever happening. Then we move on to the talent contest itself and the seemingly endless series of "semi-finals" when America votes on their favorites. Most of the voting is done by tween-girls in the Midwest who have fully harnessed the power of their ADHD for speed-dialing, and it's no surprise at all they choose "winners" such as the mayonnaise-on-white-bread Kris Allen or the annoying, embarrassing Taylor Hicks, but also near-winners like the deeply horrifying freak of nature that was Sanjaya Malakar. As for the so-called "judges" of this hot mess of a show we were regularly treated to the acerbic, sarcastic stylings of Simon Cowell, the often hilarious/more often incomprehensible ditherings of drug-addled Paula Abdul and also the enduring mystery of why Randy Jackson is even on this show at all. After all this time there may be some cracks appearing in the AI juggernaut and some long-time judges either are or may be soon exiting, most notably Abdul who was memorable in a watching-a-drunk-fall-down kind of slapstick way. If you have no idea what I'm writing about and don't know who any of these people are, consider yourself extremely lucky and know that I would gladly give up five years of my life if I could make the same claims.
False Alarm of the Year That Everyone Fell For: H1N1 Flu
Earlier this year we were all warned in the direst terms that doom is surely coming to us this fall, and everything we know of would be devastated by the H1N1 virus, a.k.a. swine flu. Nearly every day the news programs were beating the catastrophe drum and throwing out the "pandemic" card. I'm pretty sure most people don't know what a pandemic is, all they know is that it's worse than an epidemic because... well, it just is. Breathlessly the media gave us daily updates of the government's efforts to produce enough vaccine and told us in grave tones that there would not be enough! Panic, anybody? I don't know if they were trying to distract us all from the imploding financial mess, but all their gruesome threats have yet to pan out. Maybe we can consider ourselves lucky, for once.
Real Alarm of the Year That Everyone Is Ignoring: Global Warming
The evidence for global warming is everywhere, one needs only to look at such disparate locations as the polar regions and Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa. The Arctic ice fields are retreating at an alarming rate, and scientists predict the north pole area will be free of ice in the summertime sometime in the next decade, pushing the polar bears to the edge of extinction. Satellites in the southern hemisphere have been tracking an iceberg several times the size of Manhattan which broke off from the Antarctic ice sheet and was cruising past Tasmania. The glaciers on the top of Kilimanjaro are rapidly shrinking and it's all but certain they will disappear in 10 years, depriving the surrounding farms and settlements of a critical water supply. And what are Congressional "leaders" doing in this country instead of coming up with an energy policy to combat the warming? They are having teabag rallies and hollering about how someone is trying to take their guns away from them and encouraging their simple-minded followers to throw tantrums at town-hall meetings. They are so good at doing the ostrich-head-in-the-sand bit, I hope that helps whenever things really go to hell and their children and grandchildren have to find another planet to live on.
More Worst Of 2009 in Part 2.....
Most Annoying Social Trend: Tweeting/Texting/Sexting
There seems to be a concerted effort to make the spoken word obsolete, as if it's too much trouble to deal with or something. Concurrently, there seems to be a real appetite for taking the minute details of one's everyday existence and throwing them up on a global stage for everyone to see. This is narcissism and self-absorption on a level never before witnessed in history. The question is, why? I never imagined typing could be easier than just speaking but apparently it is, given the popularity of texting and tweeting. I have seen people sitting in adjacent rooms texting each other, because presumably getting up and walking to the next room to tell someone something is now considered gauche. And sexting - sending revealing/obscene pictures of yourself via cellphone - how insane is that? Once those pics get released into cyberspace they live forever and can gain a world-wide audience faster than you can sneeze. Get a grip, kids.
Dumbest Socio-Political Trend: Can't Keep It In Your Pants
Just what is it with male public figures that cause them to screw up in the most ridiculous, embarrassing way possible - getting caught with their pants down in tawdry sex scandals? Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina told his staff he was going hiking in the Appalachians when he was really skipping down to Argentina to canoodle with his alleged soul-mate. Creepy one-time presidential candidate John Edwards gave up his political aspirations along with any shred of dignity he might have had by messing around with a female videographer. Sen. John Ensign (R-NV) was busted doing something icky with a woman and his family tried to pay her hush money to keep her yap shut. Luckily, she didn't. The list goes on and on. Why do these repulsive old farts think they can play around like they're eighteen years old or something? Unfortunately there is no shortage of morality-free skanks for whom public whoring is an amusing pastime, and the combination of the two means that there will be many more stomach-churning hookups to endure for the foreseeable future.
Worst TV show of the Year: Jersey Shore
This is a very late entry into the tsunami of drivel that regularly pours out of our sets, but it has rocketed to the front of the pack and left everything else far behind in its odoriferous wake. Jersey Shore is part reality show/part weird, post-apocalyptic minstrel show which chronicles the astonishingly pointless and completely delusional lives of a group of twenty-somethings inhabiting a vacation house in Seaside Heights, New Jersey. They spend their days scantily clad bickering like mildly retarded six-year-olds and dealing with manufactured crises like running out of hair gel, and their nights trolling from night club to sleazy night club getting drunk and grinding up against one another. Referring to themselves as "guidos" and "guidettes" (which makes me really unhappy because my last name is "Guida" and I'm constantly being mistaken for Italian even though I'm Polish) they have drawn the ire of Italian-American groups who are rightfully embarrassed by their stereotypical buffoonery, but in truth anyone who claims to be a member of the human race should be profoundly mortified by their swinish, completely classless lives. America in particular and the world in general has reason to be deeply worried should any of these dimwitted pinheads start reproducing.
BONUS! Worst Show of the Decade: American Idol
AI has been around for, oh I don't know, fifty or sixty years now. Maybe it only seems that way, but what started out as an innocuous, rather unimaginative talent contest has metastasized into a cultural phenomenon, commanding stratospheric television ratings and becoming the centerpiece of the Fox TV network schedule (irony intended). Every year it's the same thing - the audition shows where severely mentally disturbed people display their total lack of talent to a nationwide audience and then lose their shit in a very public way when the truth hits them like getting smacked in the face with a dead fish. It's actually more than a little upsetting when they show you one of their "pity cases," someone who is trapped in a very bleak, dead-end life and is betting everything on this show turning them into a star when there is no chance in hell of that ever happening. Then we move on to the talent contest itself and the seemingly endless series of "semi-finals" when America votes on their favorites. Most of the voting is done by tween-girls in the Midwest who have fully harnessed the power of their ADHD for speed-dialing, and it's no surprise at all they choose "winners" such as the mayonnaise-on-white-bread Kris Allen or the annoying, embarrassing Taylor Hicks, but also near-winners like the deeply horrifying freak of nature that was Sanjaya Malakar. As for the so-called "judges" of this hot mess of a show we were regularly treated to the acerbic, sarcastic stylings of Simon Cowell, the often hilarious/more often incomprehensible ditherings of drug-addled Paula Abdul and also the enduring mystery of why Randy Jackson is even on this show at all. After all this time there may be some cracks appearing in the AI juggernaut and some long-time judges either are or may be soon exiting, most notably Abdul who was memorable in a watching-a-drunk-fall-down kind of slapstick way. If you have no idea what I'm writing about and don't know who any of these people are, consider yourself extremely lucky and know that I would gladly give up five years of my life if I could make the same claims.
False Alarm of the Year That Everyone Fell For: H1N1 Flu
Earlier this year we were all warned in the direst terms that doom is surely coming to us this fall, and everything we know of would be devastated by the H1N1 virus, a.k.a. swine flu. Nearly every day the news programs were beating the catastrophe drum and throwing out the "pandemic" card. I'm pretty sure most people don't know what a pandemic is, all they know is that it's worse than an epidemic because... well, it just is. Breathlessly the media gave us daily updates of the government's efforts to produce enough vaccine and told us in grave tones that there would not be enough! Panic, anybody? I don't know if they were trying to distract us all from the imploding financial mess, but all their gruesome threats have yet to pan out. Maybe we can consider ourselves lucky, for once.
Real Alarm of the Year That Everyone Is Ignoring: Global Warming
The evidence for global warming is everywhere, one needs only to look at such disparate locations as the polar regions and Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa. The Arctic ice fields are retreating at an alarming rate, and scientists predict the north pole area will be free of ice in the summertime sometime in the next decade, pushing the polar bears to the edge of extinction. Satellites in the southern hemisphere have been tracking an iceberg several times the size of Manhattan which broke off from the Antarctic ice sheet and was cruising past Tasmania. The glaciers on the top of Kilimanjaro are rapidly shrinking and it's all but certain they will disappear in 10 years, depriving the surrounding farms and settlements of a critical water supply. And what are Congressional "leaders" doing in this country instead of coming up with an energy policy to combat the warming? They are having teabag rallies and hollering about how someone is trying to take their guns away from them and encouraging their simple-minded followers to throw tantrums at town-hall meetings. They are so good at doing the ostrich-head-in-the-sand bit, I hope that helps whenever things really go to hell and their children and grandchildren have to find another planet to live on.
More Worst Of 2009 in Part 2.....
Friday, December 18, 2009
Best-Of List for 2009
We're going to be hit with a plethora of year-end lists over the next couple of weeks, and I am so getting on that train. I love lists and as far as I'm concerned the snarkier the better. Here then is my list of The Best of 2009, with the added bonus of some Best of the Decade nominees:
Best Television Show of the Year: Battlestar Galactica
For four seasons we followed the plight of the RTF (rag-tag fleet) as they fled their obliterated homeworlds and desperately searched for the mythical planet Earth, promised in their sacred scriptures. Relentlessly badgered by the Cylons, a race of robots the humans created and who ultimately turned against them, it seemed they could not catch a break anywhere. How can you battle an enemy who looks like you, talks like you, and to whom death is meaningless? Fact is, you can't, and you have to eventually ally with them and seek some sort of uneasy co-existence. Battlestar was not-to-be-missed television viewing for me, and was an amazing experience.
Runners-up: True Blood, Dexter, Real Time with Bill Maher, Sons of Anarchy
BONUS! Best Television Show of the Decade: Battlestar Galactica
Most Missed Television Program of the Year: The Shield
The Shield ended its six-season run this past spring, and what a run it was. Always gritty and uncompromising, it provided a fearless and unflinching look at the Machiavellian world of conflicted, good-cop/bad-cop Vic Mackey and his team of off-the-radar semi-vigilante detectives, who regularly employed highly illegal and immoral means to promote legality and morality. Backed up by great writing and an incredible cast, it was often hard to watch, as when one of the team deliberately murders another team member, but I could not look away. Awesome storytelling.
BONUS! Most Missed Television Program of the Decade: The Sopranos
This long-running, highly acclaimed HBO drama had everything: batshit-crazy mobsters, murders, mayhem, beatings, one-legged Russian floozies, the Bada Bing strip club, tacky furniture, spoiled screwed-up children, ducklings, baked ziti, lasagna - everything that makes life worthwhile. And for a couple of years HBO had an unbeatable Sunday night line-up of an hour of Sopranos followed by an hour of Six Feet Under, another fantastic show. That was the heyday of HBO and they haven't matched it since.
Runner-Up: Six Feet Under
Best Rock Band of the Year: U2
They could have just rested on their laurels and coasted through an interminable series of nostalgia concerts ("The Dinosaurs of Rock!") but instead U2 never stopped searching for barriers to break and higher goals to seek. They have continually produced relevant, exciting music and their stage shows have pushed the envelope of live entertainment. They are a very rare combination of talent and integrity. Long may they rock.
BONUS! Best Rock Band of the Decade: The Beatles
Decades after the band had broken up and even after losing two of their original members, the Beatles are still as relevant as they have always been. Their astonishing catalog of music defined an entire era and for many boomers, including me, they provided the soundtrack for a large portion of our lives. Now being introduced to an entire new generation of fans, it's easy to see that they will live up to the somewhat-hackneyed prediction that "people will be listening to their music 50 years from now." I really believe that people will.
Most Ingenious Movie Crisis: Angels and Demons
This flick had the Vatican nearly destroyed by antimatter. Brilliant! I am so there!
Most Unexpectedly Good Movie: The Wrestler
I happen to catch The Wrestler on HBO one night. I have never been a fan of Mickey Rourke but I have to say I was very impressed with his portrayal of an over-the-hill wrestler who desperately wants to have a better life but screws up at every turn. Excellent work.
Most Unexpectedly Good Performance: Susan Boyle on Britain's Got Talent
Everyone was expecting a train wreck of global proportions when a dowdy Scottish spinster and would-be singer named Susan Boyle ambled out on the stage of talent-competition show Britain's Got Talent on April 11, 2009. There was mean-spirited snickering and WTFing aplenty, but basically everyone on the planet was gobsmacked when the voice of an angel came out of her mouth. It was particularly gratifying to see those jaded, cynical judges fall all over themselves praising Boyle. I never get tired of the YouTube video of her performance and often watch it for a little feel-good pick-me-up.
Most Encouraging Socio-Political Trend: The Green Movement
Can it be that people in this country are finally catching up, even a little bit, with people all over the world in realizing the climate change is real, dangerous, and occurring right now? Maybe the message of critical time is getting through; that is, the world is rapidly approaching a tipping point that once it is passed, disastrous climate change will be inevitable. We can only hope the young people in this country will take the lead in spearheading a movement which can only save the planet for their future.
Most Admired Politician of the Year: No one yet.
Time is running out, people, work with me here.
BONUS! Most Admired Politician of the Decade: Al Gore
Al Gore has been a continual beacon of intelligence, sobriety and good sense for the entire decade. Tirelessly advocating for desperately-needed change in global energy policy, his landmark film An Inconvenient Truth laid out a thoughtful, well-reasoned and scientifically-valid argument for how we are laying waste to the only planet we have to live on. Even though he has opened many eyes to the truth, he must feel sometimes like he is a lone voice crying in the wilderness. So many people still adamantly adhere to the idea that global warming is a myth. Will they wake up too late, or not at all?
Most Respected Political Writer: TIE: Jeremy Scahill and Matt Taibbi
Jeremy Scahill is an amazingly intelligent, articulate author ("Blackwater", The Nation magazine) whose appearances on news and talk shows are always very interesting and thought-provoking. Matt Taibbi (Rolling Stone magazine) has tackled the monumental problems of the year (financial meltdown, mortgage crisis, health care) and has constantly provided amazingly detailed and well-written analyses. I wish both these writers would be read by every single person in this country who has anything to say about these extremely serious issues.
Runner-Up: Bill Moyers. For being an ordained Baptist minister he is extremely intelligent and always fascinating.
Best Technological Achievement of the Year: Fixing the Hubble Space Telescope
The highly-venerated Hubble orbital telescope, which for years has provided an astonishingly detailed, thoroughly amazing window on our universe was almost abandoned as it far exceeded its intended lifespan and critical repair and maintenance tasks added up. Luckily, due to public outcry, one more servicing mission with the Space Shuttle was made and now Hubble is back better than ever! Perhaps its biggest accomplishment has been to fire up the imagination of many many people here on earth and made them look up to the sky in wonder. Long live the Hubble Space Telescope!
BONUS! Best Technological Achievement of the Decade: HDTV
I still remember the first time I looked at an HDTV at an Ultimate Electronics store. I was amazed and mesmerized by the incredibly detailed, sharp picture. I thought back to the first time I had seen a color TV picture, in a store window in downtown Pittsburgh in the 1960s (it was a baseball game telecast) and thought to myself, I need to get me one of those. After being an HDTV owner since 2002, I am completely and totally hooked on it. HDTV is awesome, and I'm sure that the next-generation 3DTVs that will be arriving soon will be equally mind-blowing.
Favorite Food of the Year: My own recipe of Grilled Chicken marinated in Key Lime Juice and Cajun Spices
OMG! YUM! So easy to make and so tasty, if I do say so myself.
BONUS! Favorite Food of the Decade: Sushi
Edible art. Simple ingredients, but incredibly delicious. Who knew raw fish could be so good?
Best Television Show of the Year: Battlestar Galactica
For four seasons we followed the plight of the RTF (rag-tag fleet) as they fled their obliterated homeworlds and desperately searched for the mythical planet Earth, promised in their sacred scriptures. Relentlessly badgered by the Cylons, a race of robots the humans created and who ultimately turned against them, it seemed they could not catch a break anywhere. How can you battle an enemy who looks like you, talks like you, and to whom death is meaningless? Fact is, you can't, and you have to eventually ally with them and seek some sort of uneasy co-existence. Battlestar was not-to-be-missed television viewing for me, and was an amazing experience.
Runners-up: True Blood, Dexter, Real Time with Bill Maher, Sons of Anarchy
BONUS! Best Television Show of the Decade: Battlestar Galactica
Most Missed Television Program of the Year: The Shield
The Shield ended its six-season run this past spring, and what a run it was. Always gritty and uncompromising, it provided a fearless and unflinching look at the Machiavellian world of conflicted, good-cop/bad-cop Vic Mackey and his team of off-the-radar semi-vigilante detectives, who regularly employed highly illegal and immoral means to promote legality and morality. Backed up by great writing and an incredible cast, it was often hard to watch, as when one of the team deliberately murders another team member, but I could not look away. Awesome storytelling.
BONUS! Most Missed Television Program of the Decade: The Sopranos
This long-running, highly acclaimed HBO drama had everything: batshit-crazy mobsters, murders, mayhem, beatings, one-legged Russian floozies, the Bada Bing strip club, tacky furniture, spoiled screwed-up children, ducklings, baked ziti, lasagna - everything that makes life worthwhile. And for a couple of years HBO had an unbeatable Sunday night line-up of an hour of Sopranos followed by an hour of Six Feet Under, another fantastic show. That was the heyday of HBO and they haven't matched it since.
Runner-Up: Six Feet Under
Best Rock Band of the Year: U2
They could have just rested on their laurels and coasted through an interminable series of nostalgia concerts ("The Dinosaurs of Rock!") but instead U2 never stopped searching for barriers to break and higher goals to seek. They have continually produced relevant, exciting music and their stage shows have pushed the envelope of live entertainment. They are a very rare combination of talent and integrity. Long may they rock.
BONUS! Best Rock Band of the Decade: The Beatles
Decades after the band had broken up and even after losing two of their original members, the Beatles are still as relevant as they have always been. Their astonishing catalog of music defined an entire era and for many boomers, including me, they provided the soundtrack for a large portion of our lives. Now being introduced to an entire new generation of fans, it's easy to see that they will live up to the somewhat-hackneyed prediction that "people will be listening to their music 50 years from now." I really believe that people will.
Most Ingenious Movie Crisis: Angels and Demons
This flick had the Vatican nearly destroyed by antimatter. Brilliant! I am so there!
Most Unexpectedly Good Movie: The Wrestler
I happen to catch The Wrestler on HBO one night. I have never been a fan of Mickey Rourke but I have to say I was very impressed with his portrayal of an over-the-hill wrestler who desperately wants to have a better life but screws up at every turn. Excellent work.
Most Unexpectedly Good Performance: Susan Boyle on Britain's Got Talent
Everyone was expecting a train wreck of global proportions when a dowdy Scottish spinster and would-be singer named Susan Boyle ambled out on the stage of talent-competition show Britain's Got Talent on April 11, 2009. There was mean-spirited snickering and WTFing aplenty, but basically everyone on the planet was gobsmacked when the voice of an angel came out of her mouth. It was particularly gratifying to see those jaded, cynical judges fall all over themselves praising Boyle. I never get tired of the YouTube video of her performance and often watch it for a little feel-good pick-me-up.
Most Encouraging Socio-Political Trend: The Green Movement
Can it be that people in this country are finally catching up, even a little bit, with people all over the world in realizing the climate change is real, dangerous, and occurring right now? Maybe the message of critical time is getting through; that is, the world is rapidly approaching a tipping point that once it is passed, disastrous climate change will be inevitable. We can only hope the young people in this country will take the lead in spearheading a movement which can only save the planet for their future.
Most Admired Politician of the Year: No one yet.
Time is running out, people, work with me here.
BONUS! Most Admired Politician of the Decade: Al Gore
Al Gore has been a continual beacon of intelligence, sobriety and good sense for the entire decade. Tirelessly advocating for desperately-needed change in global energy policy, his landmark film An Inconvenient Truth laid out a thoughtful, well-reasoned and scientifically-valid argument for how we are laying waste to the only planet we have to live on. Even though he has opened many eyes to the truth, he must feel sometimes like he is a lone voice crying in the wilderness. So many people still adamantly adhere to the idea that global warming is a myth. Will they wake up too late, or not at all?
Most Respected Political Writer: TIE: Jeremy Scahill and Matt Taibbi
Jeremy Scahill is an amazingly intelligent, articulate author ("Blackwater", The Nation magazine) whose appearances on news and talk shows are always very interesting and thought-provoking. Matt Taibbi (Rolling Stone magazine) has tackled the monumental problems of the year (financial meltdown, mortgage crisis, health care) and has constantly provided amazingly detailed and well-written analyses. I wish both these writers would be read by every single person in this country who has anything to say about these extremely serious issues.
Runner-Up: Bill Moyers. For being an ordained Baptist minister he is extremely intelligent and always fascinating.
Best Technological Achievement of the Year: Fixing the Hubble Space Telescope
The highly-venerated Hubble orbital telescope, which for years has provided an astonishingly detailed, thoroughly amazing window on our universe was almost abandoned as it far exceeded its intended lifespan and critical repair and maintenance tasks added up. Luckily, due to public outcry, one more servicing mission with the Space Shuttle was made and now Hubble is back better than ever! Perhaps its biggest accomplishment has been to fire up the imagination of many many people here on earth and made them look up to the sky in wonder. Long live the Hubble Space Telescope!
BONUS! Best Technological Achievement of the Decade: HDTV
I still remember the first time I looked at an HDTV at an Ultimate Electronics store. I was amazed and mesmerized by the incredibly detailed, sharp picture. I thought back to the first time I had seen a color TV picture, in a store window in downtown Pittsburgh in the 1960s (it was a baseball game telecast) and thought to myself, I need to get me one of those. After being an HDTV owner since 2002, I am completely and totally hooked on it. HDTV is awesome, and I'm sure that the next-generation 3DTVs that will be arriving soon will be equally mind-blowing.
Favorite Food of the Year: My own recipe of Grilled Chicken marinated in Key Lime Juice and Cajun Spices
OMG! YUM! So easy to make and so tasty, if I do say so myself.
BONUS! Favorite Food of the Decade: Sushi
Edible art. Simple ingredients, but incredibly delicious. Who knew raw fish could be so good?
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