Luscious

Oh. It is a perfectly luscious week in the news.

First, Gonzales quit. I was running late to work yesterday so I heard the first few minutes of The Diane Rehm show. When asked what had finally driven Gonzales to resign despite the continued support of President Halfwit, one of her panelists talked about how he would go to a U.S. Attorney’s office and the U.S. Attorney in question wouldn’t show up to meet him; about how when he would speak to a group, the group had to be scolded into standing up and applauding loudly.

Dance lawyer-monkeys, dance!

President Halfwit says that Gonzales’s “name was dragged through the mud for political reasons.” If by political reasons, George means that Congress felt compelled to curtail the Attorney General’s quest to gut the Constitution, violate the law, and install President Halfwit as Dictator for Life, then he has a point. Otherwise, who does he think he’s kidding?

Just because someone is your favorite whore, doesn’t mean he’s not a whore.

So, yeah. Goodbye Gonzales. Congratulations on “Living the American Dream” by destroying America. Hope you face perjury charges, you filthy cocksucking yes-man.

Gonzales quitting was a fine thing, yes, but I have to say that I’m even more excited about Idaho Republican Larry Craig getting busted for “lewd conduct” in an airport men’s room. Reading about this was like biting into a perfect, crisp apple fresh off the tree. Crunchy and sweet and juice-dripping-off-my-chin glorious.

Although perhaps less vitriolic in his hatred of gays and lesbians than his party cohorts, his votes against allowing gays to marry or offering them protections as victims of hate crime victims is enough to cause me to turn on him and call him out for being yet another hypocritical closet case.

Had he been content to be another pathetic bastard trying to subdue his self-loathing, I would feel sorry for him. However, since he felt compelled to ameliorate his personal sense of shame by attempting to inflict it on others, I feel justified in the following in laughing hysterically at his plight while relishing his public humiliation and, I hope, the impending premature failure of his political career.

I am especially pleased by the stupid desperation of trying to get his Senatorial Wee-wee played with in an airport bathroom. What? No time in the schedule to pay a visit to a truckstop?

A Whole New Lease On Life

I have had a stupid day.

I sat at work, all day, while two 12-year-olds from the central office attempted to assist us with our supremely worthless computer system. Although it is now clear to me that this toad was foisted on them in much the same manner it has been on us, the unsuspecting end users, five hours talking about all this shit these cheerleaders don't know made me want to chew glass.

World news is unremittingly bad. Iraq is becoming an inescapable monster to which we feed American soldiers and Iraqis alike. Our fearless leader continues to be a halfwit. On the way home from work today I heard that Alberto Gonzales began his illustrious career misleading Senators all the way back in April of 2005 when he told them that, "There has not been one verified case of civil liberties abuse," despite the fact that he was in receipt of reports of at least six.

Maybe he wasn't lying. Maybe he's just illiterate. Hey, it happens. Just look at President Retread.

It's hot. It's humid. I am fucking sick nigh unto weeping of home improvement projects. I'm tired. I'm crabby. I don't think my meds are working.

Just when I was about ready to say fuck it all, I visited The Liquor Fairy's site, which led me here, which lead me to this absolute gem of a message board post:

I am really excited to have this product over the counter. I was in the clinical trials years ago and lost 40 lbs in 2 months. I kept it off for years until I got off my food plan and quit walking.

I can tell you that my first experience in trying to cheat on this pill was very embarrassing! I went out to eat Japanese stir fry and had my first "accident" - (shall we call it "Alli-opps" now?) before I could get home. I had uncontrollable oily seepage...It looks just like spagetti grease for those of you who are curious.

You cannot get it out of your clothes so I would encourge you to use a panty liner until you find out how you react to the medication. If you are sitting down, whatever you are sitting on will be stained. . so be careful.

On the other hand, if you stay on tract w/ your food plan (low fat) you will not have any problems...or at least I didn't. Occassional gas but I learned when I could pass it (on the toilet)!

Another tip - get a bottle of Grease Release and keep it next to the toilet so that you can spray the bowl after each bowel movement... gets rid of the grease line.

Bottom line. it is kind of like Antibuse for the alcoholic... if you don't eat too much fat you will be ok but if you do, you will pay w/ unpleasant side effects.

I LOVE IT!

I have a new fucking lease on life, hand to god. At the very least, I can have chips and dip for dinner and not have to worry about shoving a tampon up my ass and having to clean my toilet with degreaser. Things aren't so bad, after all.

Eat me, Alito

Did anyone else notice when the Supreme Court voted 5-4 to seriously fuck over all the women in America this week? Anyone? Bueller?

No, it wasn't a reproductive rights decision. Right now they are satisfied on that front, having ruled that the cocksuckers in Congress are better qualified than our doctors and ourselves to determine what medical procedures we might or might not need. Unlike the recent decision to uphold the so-called "partial birth abortion" ban, their latest infernal ass-fucking will piss off any thinking human regardless of his or her opinion on abortion

No, no. This latest judicial slap in the face even screws over women who are safely past their child-bearing years. In Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co. the Court decided, in essence, that while it is indeed illegal for companies to discriminate based on sex, it is only illegal for about six months. After that, it's fine. Or, at least, not actionable.

Same goddamned difference.

I suggest following the link and and reading the brief little analytical article on it. I might try to read the actual opinion once my blood pressure lowers itself enough that I can again see clearly, but I haven't yet. Here, though, is a synopsis :

Lilly Ledbetter retired from Goodyear after working there for 19+ years. At the time of her retirement, she earned $559 less than the lowest paid man who held the same position as she did. She had been paid less her entire career with Goodyear, based on the fact that she happened to be a woman at the time she was hired. The Court ruled that she could no longer to sue because Goodyear intended to discriminate only at the time they hired her, and Title VII stipulates she only had about six months from that date to file suit.

So, every time they they failed to STOP fucking her over because she was a woman? That's not important to this story. The fact that discovering pay disparity requires knowing what one's co-workers are paid, a process soundly discouraged by companies and by custom? Not important. The fact that the source of the original pay discrepancy, i.e. a vagina, was not at question? Tough titty.

You have GOT to be fucking shitting me. Seriously. This cannot be 2007. Continuing to fuck someone over for nigh unto 20 years does not constitute an ongoing intent to discriminate?

Fuck you, Alito. Seriouly. Fuck you.

E-mail? What E-mail?

My dear friend, the esteemed Liquor Fairy, recently blogged in response to the Retread Administration assertion that they have deleted—and cannot find—four years of e-mail that Karl Rove sent from his GOP account, including documents relating to the firing of federal prosecutors.

First of all, damn. Can you imagine what a wretched burden it would have to be to slog through four years of e-mail written by Karl Rove to other Republicans? The thought of it is giving me palpitations. Four years worth of “We should just EAT the poor. And brown people.”

Second of all, and more importantly, Mandy suggests that this “We deleted these e-mails and can no longer recover them,” is President Retread’s latest way of telling Congress to get bent. Instead of claiming executive privilege or screaming “I’m invisible! You can’t see me!” the president’s latest let-them-eat-cake move is just to say “We lost’em.” Worked for Nixon. Okay, not really, but whatever.

Her argument is that the Feds can certainly locate the deleted files on the hard drive in question, or at some servers down at AT&T, or something. And under normal circumstances, I would agree with her. But then? Then I actually take a look a this administration.

This is the person who brought us the war in Iraq. “Bring them on.” Who declared the "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq, back in 2003. President Retread brought us Hurricanegedon Katrina and its shocking, horrific, “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job” aftermath.

We couldn’t get potable water to American citizens. In America. They might NOT be able to get those e-mails back. Hell, I’m half surprised they managed to turn the little laptop fucker on.

I say we let Otto try.

Extreme Stupidity Challenge, Current Events Edition

So, I am finishing waking from the comfy nap that was my vacation and I am finding that, perhaps predictably, people did not get smarter while I was gone.

*sigh*

Let’s take a cursory glance at a couple of national, local, and not-quite-news stories from the past few days.

People Who Are Too Stupid Read Things Face Housing Woes

Certainly, everyone by now has heard that the housing market is circling the drain and that late mortgage payments and foreclosures are on the rise, especially among sub-prime borrowers, now that people’s adjustable-rate mortgages are beginning to “reset.”

Duh, motherfuckers.

I mean, come on. You have crappy credit, or don’t make enough to easily afford to buy a too big house in Whitehaven or some other exurban hellhole, so to get what you want you take on some incredibly stupid and risky loan. THEN, instead of addressing the problem by rebuilding your credit or selling a kidney or something, you expect a miracle to come along and fix your problem for you. Because, yeah, double digit percentage growth in home values is an historically common occurrence.

Look. I’m sure there are scumbags who lied outright about the terms of these loans. I am certain to my toes that there were tons of irresponsible mortgage brokers/loan officers/bankers/loan sharks who sold these loans to unsuspecting rubes without adequately explaining the terms. That said, though, who signs a document promising to repay tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars without at least a cursory understanding of the terms?

It’s not important that you know what the “LIBOR index” to which your fully-indexed mortgage rate will be tied is, but it is pretty fucking important that you get that your sweet “teaser rate” will only be guaranteed for five years, and that after that it is going be tied to this other rate, which is almost certainly going to cost you a metric crap-ton of additional greenback dollars every month.

Back when I was married, and we had ARMs on our houses, I had a decent grasp on what was going on with my home loans. I knew the time frame for the expiration of the teaser rates (one was five years, one was 7); I knew the adjustment periods after that (one was once a year, one was six months); I knew the adjustment caps (2% max upward adjustment for each); I know that the 5/2 could be locked after the first adjustment into a 30-year fixed (which would have still left us forever with an APR below 7.5%); and I never intended to have the stupid loans that long, anyway (and didn’t).

How many people didn’t even attempt to grasp any part of that fairly simple information? When I worked at a mortgage broker, how many times did I hear her explain to people to whom we were giving subprime loans that they needed to rebuild their credit so they could get out of those loans at the conclusion of two years? How many times did I see the words go into one ear only to drift, like dandelion fluff on an April breeze, out the other?

Whatever. Yes, it’s a shame that folks are getting into trouble, and I’m sure that some have been legitimately deceived. Self-deception doesn’t count, and an inability to see the writing on the wall is not a legitimate handicap. It’s just stupid.

St. Louis City Schools See Writing On the Wall, But No One Can Read It

The Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has revoked the accreditation of the St. Louis City Schools. No one who has been paying the least bit of attention is the tiniest bit surprised.

There was a protest at the DESE meeting, complete with some teenager shoving a cop, then running, then getting maced, which makes me think this kid’s social studies’ teachers probably did an inadequate job covering civil disobedience and non-violent protest.

After the melee was quelled, the DESE Board predictably voted to, I don’t know, draw and quarter the school board and replace them with Muppets or whatever. Yes, this is terrible. The alternative? Immeasurably worse.

So, what’s noteworthy about this? Two things.

A current St. Louis board member called the decision, among other things, a move toward “regentrification” of the city, an attempt to make it more white. Huh? First of all, I don’t think “regentrfication” is a word (and neither does Microsoft Office). Second, saying that the district is grossly failing students and needs to do better—that’s a white thing? This woman should be forced to sit in room and write her inane statement 500 times as punishment for her all-encompassing idiocy.

Then, because I had not suffered NEARLY enough on my morning commute, the leader of the union that represents the St. Louis teacher’s union stood up and said that their primary concern was making sure that the state didn’t do anything to alter the current teachers’ contract.

Oh. My. God.

I hope this woman’s face rots and her brain falls out *splat* onto the sidewalk. That has got to be the most idiotic thing I’ve ever heard said by anyone who wasn’t trying to talk me into taking off my panties. Shouldn’t, oh I dunno, the miserably failing students be the teachers’ primary concern? Just maybe? Just a thought . . .


(This link might include the two above statements...like I said, I was yelling at my car stereo. Listen to the MP)

Mom Apparently Fattening Son For Slaughter; State Intervenes
I’m sure that you all saw the link to the video of the woman in West Virginia who is at risk of having the state take her 7-year-old son from her because he weighs more than 250 pounds. Okay, um, wow. I usually don’t watch these things, but this one got my attention. I gave it a gander.

Jay-sus. One of a few things is going on here:
1. This woman suffers from some neo-Krispy Kreme- Munchausen-by-proxy abuse thing. She’s intentionally fattening this kid up for some twisted purpose of her own. Sometimes, folks is just CRAZY.
2. This woman is a serious idiot, who despite what she has been told by the various doctors to whom she has dragged this poor kid, just doesn’t understand the basic principles of nutrition.
3. She’s dim, and the doctors she’s seen have been either weak-willed morons educated in offshore backwaters who have either failed to adequately educate this woman, or have failed to test this kid for some kind of awful disease or hormonal imbalance or something. Let’s not rule that out as a possibility.

I’m leaning towards numbers 1 or 2, and here’s why: If you watch the video, it shows at least a partial list of what she feeds this kid in a day. First is breakfast, which consists of “ 4 eggs” and some other stuff.

What? WHAT? FOUR eggs? This kid is SEVEN. I’m 30. I’m 5’10, and curvy, and even at my most hung-over; plummeting blood sugar; been-out-all-night-drinking-and-dancing so feed-me-before-I-gut-you morning time starvation the most I can choke down is three.

For a moment, let’s give this woman the benefit of the doubt and assume she’s not fattening this kid up for slaughter or something. If that’s the case, before the state further screws up this kid by yanking him from his mom, they should do the following (clearly, I feel all list-makey today):
1. Send a nutritionist to his house who will throw away all processed foods of any kind and re-teach Mom how to cook.
2. Hire a trainer to Mousercize this kid’s ass.
3. Repo the video games and disconnect the cable.