Monday, December 13, 2010

Week of 12/13/2010

The 2010 Brutally Honest Awards
– by David Matthews 2

Well folks here it is, the end of another year. And as has been tradition for all of these years, it’s time to wrap up the year with a look back at the best and worst… and mostly worst.

The Biggest FAILURE in 2010: President Barack Obama and the Democrat-run Congress – I know this is going to be a shock to some folks, but let’s get brutally honest here… this whole year has been nothing but a huge sinking pile of FAIL for the Democrats in general, for Obama in particular, and especially for the rest of the world.

I know the “official” excuse is that it’s supposedly the fault of the GOP and their “Party of HELL NO” mindset, but that line only works one time. After that, it’s on you to not COUNT on the GOP.

Worse yet, this President and this Congress literally FORGOT about the FIFTEEN MILLION Americans that have been out of work, with more than half of them considered “long-term” unemployed, which means they are considered “non-hirable” according to all of the so-called “experts”. Writing off FIFTEEN MILLION Americans is FAR WORSE than when the Bush Imperium wrote off the people stranded in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. At least THEY got help nine days after the fact and the media was on the president’s ass about it every single day. On three separate occasions, including the current one as of this article, the Congress and the White House literally WROTE OFF those FIFTEEN MILLION Americans as part of a political game with the GOP.

What’s worse is that the Democrats then expected people to actually THANK THEM for this ongoing gross incompetence! They think that the people just don’t know about all of the “good” things that they’ve done. Well, I know about FIFTEEN MILLION Americans who would think otherwise!

And they have the audacity to wonder WHY they lost control of the House this past November!

The Worst Villains in America for 2010: The GOP – Like you didn’t see this one coming. The whole “Party of Insurrection” game of theirs really sank them to a whole new level of scum.

Help for the Unemployed? – No.

Help for 9/11 Responders? – No.

Stopping the abuses of banks? – No.

Ratifying an arms treaty with Russia that was started under another President? – No.

Approving judges? – No.

Recess Appointments (something they had no problems with previously)? – No.

Time of day? – No.

They only things they ever say “yes” to are their own cushy needless raises and approving tax breaks for their rich friends.

The Second Worst Villains in America for 2010: The Transportation Security Administration – When it comes to making people jump through hoops to prove they’re not bad guys, just because “you can” is not a sufficient reason why “you should”.

In my trip to and from Oklahoma City for ShockNet Radio, I had to take off my shoes, empty my pockets, take off my belt, remove myself of everything except the clothes on my back, and put them all on trays to be scanned along with my laptop case and cellphones. No I didn’t get “scanned nekkid” nor did I get subjected to the grab-and-grope, but at the same time a lot of these restrictions that are being imposed are needless.

The Third Worst Villain in America in 2010: British Petroleum – You turn the Gulf of Mexico into a Premium toilet, decimate an already crippling economy from those who make their money on the Gulf, complain about having to put up $20 billion to cover the damages, wonder WHY Obama decides to stop offshore drilling, point fingers at everyone BUT yourselves, and your CEO then complains to the media that he wants to have his life back.

And you think that people should just forgive and forget about it?

What actually surprises me is that there hasn’t been a single arrest in this yet. But then again we are dealing with the Obama FAIL.

The Biggest Unrepentant Sacks Of Hypocritical Monkey Dung in 2010: The WikiLeaks Complainers – I’ll make this as PAINFULLY simple as possible. For all of you who want Julian Assange of WikiLeaks arrested and tried as a terrorist, you better be going after Dick Cheney, Robert Novak, and everyone else associated with the outster of Valerie Plane. Assange didn’t violate two federal laws and one Executive Order. Everyone associated with Plame’s outster DID!

And while you’re at it, don’t expect people to be cooperative when it comes to spotting bad guys if you’re going to continue with your “Don’t Snitch” mindset over this subject.

Hey, here’s a little suggestion… if you don’t want people to find out the dirty little games that you play behind the scenes…. DON’T PLAY THEM! Is that too hard to figure out?

The Worst Celebutant in 2010: Lindsey Lohan – Let’s see… lie about drugs, go to jail (which was measured by a stopwatch), go to rehab (measured by another stopwatch), gets a bunch of quacks to proclaim she NEVER took drugs, then gets busted in a drug test and ADMITS doing drugs, and somehow manages to repeat the process? And people wonder why Hollywood is messed up?

The Misogynistic Redneck Award in 2010: (Newly-elected US Senator) Rand Paul - A week before the election, one of Paul’s county campaign leaders decided to put his FOOT DOWN on the head of a MoveOn.org protester who was being illegally forced to the ground. That is not a play on words; he literally STOMPED ON HER HEAD! And then he had the nerve to go on the air and demand an apology from the woman whose head he intentionally stomped on. Oh, and the police didn’t do a damn thing about it! And Paul still ended up winning?

Keep that scene in the back of your mind, folks… that is what the GOP is going to do for the next two years!

The Worst Flakes in 2010: Glenn Beck, Christine O’Donnell, and Sarah Palin – “I’m not a witch, I’m you.” Beck’s dementia. “How’s that hopey-changey writing on my hand?” THESE are supposed to be the voices of “The Alternative”????

The Worst News Service in 2010: FoxNews – PT Barnum was an optimist. There’s a sucker born every minute, and that sucker is watching FoxNews and not figuring out that some of the “headlines” are political propaganda by GOP consultants and others are fabrications taken from “The Onion”.

The Biggest Out-And-Out LIE of 2010: Details of President Obama’s Trip to India - $200 million A DAY, 35 warships, 3000 staff members, a fleet of aircraft (one exclusively for the White House dog), 500 rooms at the Taj Mahal, and all according to one “anonymous source in the Indian government”. All LIES! And they can’t even say they got it from The Onion!

Like I said, PT Barnum was an optimist.

The Biggest Testosterone Film of 2010: “The Expendables” – Let’s see… Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Randy Couture, Dolph Lundgren, Steve Austin, Mickey Rourke, Bruce Willis, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, with eye-candy Charisma Carpenter and Giselle Ite added for good measure… guns, explosions, and an automatic shotgun with explosive shells… the only things missing here were Wesley Snipes, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Seaven Segal, beer, and T&A. Forget Viagra and Cialis, just pop in “The Expendables” and by the credits you won’t worry about “performance”.

The Mad Profit of 2010: Glenn Beck – According to Glenn Beck, the Beckpocalypse is at hand! Heralded by the antichrist Obama with his three horsemen – Van Jones, George Soros, and Reverend Wright – the economy will collapse, civilization will follow, and the Earth will plunge into endless darkness and despair! So you better turn to (the Mormon) GOD, invest in a Doomsday Food Bank, and stop using money because it will soon become worthless in the Post-Beckpocalypse world! (This message brought to you by Goldscam.)

The Most Honest Description of Politicians in 2010: Republicorp! – Sadly, this turned out to be a political campaign by MoveOn.org, but it still encapsulated the whole GOP/conservative/neo-conservative movement! The unholy marriage of Big Corporate, FoxNews, and the GOP was exposed for what it is, and sadly nobody noticed.

Republicorp – We Decide, You Comply.

The Worst Comic Book Idea in 2010: The Return of Dead Heroes – Once upon a time the dead came back only through convoluted plot twists where a corpse was faked, or the person was cloned, or their “resurrection” is but a hoax. Now death is but a convenient plot twist for comic book writers. Captain America is dead! No, wait, he’s replaced by Bucky. But isn’t Bucky dead? No, he was saved and brainwashed. But Steve Rogers is back too! What? Yeah! Batman is dead! No, wait, Dick Grayson (Robin/Nightwing) is Batman. But Bruce Wayne is back too! What? Yeah!

Please! Will someone PLEASE put an end to the revolving death’s door?

The Worst Cartoon Idea in 2010: The “Re-imagining” of 80’s Greats – There is a new cable channel called “The Hub” that has been showing “new” series of old favorites. “G.I. Joe” is now “G.I. Joe: Renegades”, which remakes the 80’s heroes as an “A-Team”-style gang of outlaws going against Big Corporate Cobra. “Transformers” is now “Transformers: Prime”, and they don’t even look like the Michael Bay versions, never mind any semblance to the 80’s toys that they are supposed to be!

Please folks! ENOUGH! If you’re going to bring back the classics, DO THEM RIGHT!

The Most Annoying Instrument In The World for 2010: The vuvuzela - “Will you PLEASE stop slaughtering your pet pig? We’re trying to watch the World Cup!” “That’s not me! That’s on TV.” “What?” “Yeah, a whole bunch of morons brought some plastic tribal horns with them and they’re disrupting everything.” “When’s the next commercial break?”

The Most Annoying Ego-Trip Movie for 2010: “The Social Network” - Seriously? A film about the start of FACEBOOK? And we’re supposed to be excited about that? What’s next? A film about Twitter?

And finally…

The Best Online Radio Show in 2010: The American Heathen® 5th Anniversary Extravaganza and Riproarin’ Roastapalooza! - Okay, this is somewhat biased, because I was the host of the last part of that special, but if there was any way for the year to come to a close, it would be with a collection of personalities past and present, and to end with the biggest belly-laugh possible!

And with that, 2010 comes to a close for this commentator. It’s been a hell of a year… and not all of it good. Well, most of it wasn’t good. But let’s hope 2011 will be better - IN SPITE OF the GOP.

Monday, December 6, 2010

Week of 12/06/2010

If Dictionaries Were Bipartisan…
– by David Matthews 2

It is said that history is written by the conqueror. That probably explains why people like Glenn Beck are hell-bent on re-writing it. No doubt if they had their way, school children would eventually be reading about how the Conservative Pilgrims (formerly the Puritans) sailed to North America in gold-plated battleships to “save” the “godless heathens” (formerly the Native Americans) from the “evils” of the liberal French trappers and establish a great “Republic of God”.

Thankfully their revisionism hasn’t yet reached the dictionaries. I think partially this is because dictionaries are still something that has to be READ. But if there is enough incentive, I’m sure we’ll soon see an interactive Foxonary Channel.

Sadly our social processes has become so politically polarized that we seem to have alternate ideas about everything. Polarized news, polarized radio, polarized stores, polarized TV shows, even toy dolls are being polarized! At this rate it’s only a matter of time before the very English language we take for granted is polarized with separate dictionaries… one for Dems and one for the GOP.

After all, for a few years we did just that with Thanksgiving! If you don’t believe me, then do a Google search for the word “Franksgiving” and you’ll see for yourself. There was one Thanksgiving for Democrats and one a week later for the GOP.

And of course there are the continual jokes about elections being held on separate days depending on your political affiliation and on who is telling the “joke”. (Oh, and I’m going to be kind and say that it IS a joke, and not some crass political tactic worthy of hunting down the perpetrators and waterboarding them.)

So let’s take that polarization and show how it would be applied to a few random entries in the English Dictionary… with one entry for the Democrats (DEM) and one for the GOP (GOP).

Now let’s get brutally honest here… I know that some of the definitions are going to be exaggerated. And they’re done intentionally to prove a point. They’re done to show that those who claim to want “common ground” fail to recognize that there is very little ground left that is “common”.

So here we go…

--

WAR (noun)
DEM: A state of armed hostility between two factions often resulting in needless tragedy. Something to be avoided at all costs.
GOP: A perpetual state of being for those who fight for our way of life. It is preferably waged with huge amounts of ordinance designed to “shock and awe” the enemy and to impress viewers when it is replayed on the nightly news and again on the Military Channel.

SOLDIER (noun)
DEM: A necessary evil in a free society.
GOP: The ultimate form of citizenry. When properly trained and deployed, a soldier will obey any and all orders without question. His or her sacrifice is to be remembered at all times. His or her death in service is to be canonized and glorified for all time (unless said citizen later becomes a liberal; see also “Traitor”).

DOG (noun)
DEM: A cute furry four-legged animal no bigger than a woman’s purse designed to be dressed up in cute little outfits and treated as furry children.
GOP: Lumbering creatures the size of small children who serve as friend and guardian. Fiercely loyal, and will chase down and devour liberals on sight, smell, or voice command. Also sometimes used for entertainment when pay-per-view wrestling is not affordable. (See also “chupacabra”, “Cujo”.)

CAT (noun)
DEM: Adorable furry four-legged animals; highly temperamental but extremely loving.
GOP: Shedding, scratching, oversized rats best served by being fed to a dog.

BELIEVE (verb)
DEM: Accepting a premise or action or idea without proof.
GOP: Something that all citizens must do when dealing with a government under GOP control.

COMPROMISE (verb)
DEM: A method of negotiation which allows for progress between different but peaceful factions.
GOP: Something that only Democrats and liberals engage in. (See also: “obscenity”.)

FAIL (verb)
DEM: Something that can never happen when Democrats are in charge of the government.
GOP: Something that only Democrats and liberals do.

LIE (verb)
DEM: Something that only GOP and conservatives engage in.
GOP: Something that Democrats and liberals engage in on a perpetual basis.

GUN (noun)
DEM: A vile, vile weapon designed to kill anything and everything. Such an item can never be allowed to exist and it is the mission of all humans to eliminate it at all costs.
GOP: The power of God in the hands of man, especially when wielded by a conservative.

FAIR (noun)
DEM: Something that WE determine.
GOP: A fictional concept invented by the liberals to justify depriving you of everything you have.

RIGHTS (noun)
DEM: Anything that you do that WE deem to be important enough to defend.
GOP: A fictional concept created by the liberals to justify doing whatever they want.

TRUTH (noun)
DEM: Something that is real and can be defended with proof.
GOP: Anything FoxNews says.

And finally…

FREEDOM (noun)
DEM: Whatever DEMOCRATS (and ONLY Democrats) determine it to be.
GOP: Whatever the GOP (and ONLY the GOP) determine it to be.