Swamp Elective

    Nice job Main Stream Media! Now that the terrorists know that we are all afraid of cartoon characters they will stop designing their improvised explosive devices, which they place in major cities to look like Mickey Mouse, Robot Chicken, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force. The split-second reactions of the Boston Police and emergency crews demonstrate or readiness for this tactic. Don’t you know that they monitor every move that we make? And they will exploit every weakness. Don’t think, for a moment, that the next major terror attack is not going to happen during The Filenes basement Wedding Dress sale. They know we can’t stay away.

    How will you be able to live with yourselves when the inevitable exploding puppies are mailed to the children of America? Why don’t you just put the anthrax in the TGIFriday’s potato skins with extra cheese yourself? Are you too lazy? Sure, you’ll just write a long article about how Mom and Pop America doesn’t randomly check their food for explosives when they eat out at casual dining chains. That on average, only one in fifty people ever asks the bomb squad to remove a suspicious plate of Buffalo wings and have it tested for neuro-toxins. “I didn’t tell Al Queda to open a maple syrup factory that produces delicious tangy nectar laced with small pox so they could under-cut current suppliers and infiltrate the IHOP late-night/early morning pancake and waffle community and sicken the half of the Eastern seaboard.” Sure you didn’t, you tell yourself what ever you have to, but you might as well have the way you reported the news from Boston this week. Please, I beg you to think before you print any more how-to manuals for those that would do us harm.

America has an immigration problem and it’s not the one you think it is or the one you’re being trained to worry about. Any sociologist, anthropologist or halfway honest economist (even) will tell you the impact of immigration legal, illegal, and grey market combined is a net positive for the US. It has been in the past, is so now and barring some Star Trek style interplanetary migration requiring radically different food sources or basic bathroom fixtures it will be in the future.
No, the problem is that the Democrats and the Republicans who have neatly divided the religious communities into fear-based Pavlovian symmetry for optimal bicameral fund-raising are now faced with an energized electorate that refuses to respond as a homogenous monolithic voting block.
How can we pander to a group that clings to the idea of human decency and social justice like a buzzard on a shit wagon?
The Cubans are solidly conservative Republicans but that’s only because they are all anti-Castro. Castro is 112 years old now and 20 minutes after he’s dead there’s going to be a Trump Towers Havana open with naked hookers in the lobby to take your bags. Not to mention that the Cubans, in this country, are all in Florida and New York and those two states have nothing else in common but Jewish grandmothers who mostly vote Democratic.
The Mexicans are mostly catholic and mostly against abortion but also huge supporters of labor unions.
El Salvadorians political affiliation depends on when they came here we’re pretty sure the ones who came during the Reagan years are firmly anti-death squad but there’s this whole new people’s revolution happening in Central America now.
Don’t get me started on the Guatemalans the Peruvians the Hondurans. And that’s just a few of the Hispanic groups! Wait until the Asian groups get organized and start calling their elected officials.
The politicians thought they had the perfect bright shiny object to dazzle the electorate with, so that no one would notice their incompetence on a raft of other issues. Scapegoat the non-voting outsider and blame him for your (fill in the blank) trouble is right there on page 2 of your Joseph Goebbels “Subvert the Process of Democracy for Use by Corporate Powers Hymn Book” how could it fail? But this hornet’s nest was a bad choice for this election cycle’s piñata and I just hope the right broomstick wielding douche bags get stung.

In our ongoing effort keep the “Big News” audiences entertained and informed, enlightened and delighted we present the latest installment of “Under the Radar” a segment intended to highlight less publicized events from the weeks news.
It’s surprisingly easy, these days, for seemingly large political happenings to go relatively unnoticed. Of course when you set the bar at shooting a guy in the face and forgetting to inform the authorities for 18 hours it’s understandable how lopping off major hunks of the Constitution falls by the wayside. That is why it doesn’t surprise me that President Bush’s call for a line item veto hasn’t managed to push the shock of gay-themed cowboy movie awards show letdown out of the water-cooler spotlight.
President Bush, as you may remember from our last episode or episodes 1-164, has been the architect of the largest budget deficit in the history of the world (a fact made more mind boggling when you realize he started with a surplus.) And just this last week has decided to “exercise some fiscal discipline” to reign in out of control spending. The congress who have rubberstamped everything the President has requested have gotten into the nasty habit of adding items into bills that might actually benefit the people they were sent to Washington to serve! So our fearless leader who has never once vetoed a whole bill now needs the authority to remove specific items from legislation. But don’t worry this is the trust me I know what’s best for everybody because I talk to God President he would never use a line item veto to punish specific lawmakers. Would He?
And even more obscure. From their first day in office this administration has been systematically going through the National Archives and reclassifying documents that have heretofore been public in an effort to manipulate what the public can access as our collective “history. Now my initial instinct is to cry fascism but I’ve done a little research on this and they just don’t have the snazzy uniforms for it dark suits and Brooks brothers ties just don’t cut it when your competing with Mussolini but maybe next year.

Having grown up in the United States with my formative years coinciding with the Reagan years I have more poseur patriotism right under the surface than I am usually willing to admit. Like when the newspapers says that Kim Jong Ill is “threatening us with nuclear weapons.” There is a part of me that thinks, what does he have 6 nukes? HA! Choose your target carefully my strange little platform shoe wearing weirdo ‘cause you may take out a half million with a lucky shot but there is nothing like annihilating a culture to bring Americans together. Native Americans, Nazis, North Koreans no matter once we get the hatred machine warmed up you are toast! And in that I take some sort of badly malformed pride.
America is a great and wondrous nation but what no one can deny us is our ability to kill lots of other people quickly and efficiently when we really set our minds to it. We are an incredibly strong and ill-tempered child.
“My dad can beat up your dad” it was a fight we never really wanted to see but it was important that we felt secure in that way. My dad could beat up your dad if he had to. Couldn’t he? Which leaves us with the question of the ages “if he had to” for a parking space, for a couple of bucks for “honor?” It’s best not to ask yourself these questions not because they are not valid but because Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney can hear what you’re thinking.
Now if you will excuse me my tinfoil hat has just been sent back from the cleaning and repair guys. (If you don’t keep it clean it gets feedback from the listener and you can’t type.)

Recently civil rights leader Coretta Scott King was laid to rest in Atlanta. Many of those participating in the memorial felt moved to continue her legacy, at the service, by pointing out the failures of the current administration in fulfilling Ms. King’s vision of social justice.
And somehow Rush Limbaugh, Matt Drudge, and Sean Hannidy felt that they have a better idea of how to protect the King legacy and greater respect for what she would have wanted than the reverend who founded the Christian Leadership council with Dr. King. They also claim to know better than her family and dozens of other folks who actually knew and/or had ever met the woman! These men who are in sworn opposition to everything she fought for speak to the American people as authorities on proper mourning conduct.
This all points to one thing, a legal remedy. Just like a prenuptial agreement or a do not resuscitate order each of us should sit down and spell out exactly who and what can be discussed at our funerals. It’s the ultimate in anal-retentive control freak planning!
To whom it may concern feel free to pillory any hatful moron who claims Christian superiority to ruin my favorite country. You can use my ashes to poison his food. Or use and body part you care to for a practical joke, for that matter you can shake my now lifeless pecker in his face if you think it will make one whit of difference. Most importantly have fun, take risks, laugh really really hard and please no carnations. This is important people, do it for the children!

While we were all mesmerized by the big events of last week like “Did Brad and Angelina really plan to have a baby before the divorce was final?” “Which Super bowl commercial was the best?” and “Who would have the distinct privilege of adorning J. Lo’s copious caboose with flattering fabric for this weeks Grammy awards?” (I have my fingers crossed for Vera Wang) Several stories seem to have “flown under the radar” of the Main Stream Media.
These are my personal favorites but something tells me we could fill a whole empty Ethics Committee office space with similar items.
After the whole Jack Abrahmoff mess the administration is so sensitive to even the mere appearance of impropriety that they filled the opening on the FCC board with a former tele-communications lobbyist! That’s right the FCC’s newest board members used to have to pay for public policy now he just gets to make it. Cannot for the life of me figure out how Fox News missed that one.
The second one is a connect the dots game that goes something like this. On Wednesday of last week President Bush in his State of the Union address said that he wanted to hire 70, 000 new math and science teachers. On Monday his budget was released decreasing spending on education (insert your favorite Bush bad at math joke here) but it was a good idea for the four days in between and I’m sure lots of children benefited from the good cheer and optimism spread by the State of the Union address.

Imam Pat Robertson has called a fatwah on Hugo Chavez! OK, not really but I thought if I used the proper buzzwords for “some crazy fuck religious extremist is telling his followers to go out and kill somebody” it might get more of a reaction than the “Gosh what a silly old man” it seems to be generating in the Main Stream Media. For those that don’t know, Hugo Chavez is the president of Venezuela and Pat Robertson president of the “Moral Majority” has proposed a late 95th trimester abortion for him. Why does Pat Robertson hate Hugo Chavez? Because Chavez is a leftist not a full-blown Communist mind you, a leftist. He was elected, democratically, on the promise that perhaps some of the wealth of Venezuela could be used to ameliorate a tiny bit of that country’s wretched and abject poverty. So Pat Robertson as a good and observant Christian wants him killed. Did I mention that this natural wealth that Chavez wants shared come from the nation’s supply of oil? I’m sure that’s incidental no one would propose we get rid of a head of state to insure unfettered access…What was I? Oh right. Jesus said: “That which you do onto the least of my brothers that you do onto me.” He asked, “Are you not your brothers keeper?” Helping the poor and eliminating the suffering of the poor is mentioned 300 times in the Bible. Now, I’m no Bible scholar but this Jesus guy he sounds like a leftist. Pat Robertson makes millions of dollars a year praying for himself! He owns a television network and the news media are acting like “Oh, that’s just grandpa we don’t let him have the remote anymore” My point is this, we can no longer let these pricks call themselves Christians or Americans or Moral anything with out forcing them to explain their rampant idiocy. And I don’t want the press corps to ask questions; I want Jesuits. Give me a group of Boston College theological seminary graduate students and a bus and we’ll stick microphones in these nut jobs faces and make them answer questions until they cry and their ears bleed. Yeah, I know, it’s never going to happen but a guy dream can’t he?

If you believe that Ralph Nader most closely represents your worldview and would make an excellent president, by all means vote for him. It is your democratic right, dare I say, your duty, to do so. But if you believe that your vote is anything more than a “protest vote” wake up. We have a winner take all system. And the Bush people take that quite literally, anything that is not figuratively and/or explicitly nailed down is being carted away to Bush’s campaign contributors. So if you want to protest, buy a fucking T-shirt! Stop traffic in front of the White House; hold an anti-War water balloon fight. But for fuck sake don’t vote for an egomaniacal consumer advocate and pretend it will do fuck-all for “change.” I could tell you exactly what options I would like on my Ferrari but it won’t mean a damn thing because I don’t own one and I’m not going to any time soon! Not excited by Kerry? Just concentrate on the four more years of lubeless sphincter stretching we’re in for, sack up and pull the lever anyway! Consider yourself warned.

Let’s learn from the Spanish. No I didn’t say let’s learn some Spanish. Though, that might be helpful in decoding what flavor smoke our hypocritical politicians are blowing up our little brown neighbor’s asses this election season. No, I’m talking about the Spaniards who A) didn’t take any shit when it came to the War in Iraq they protested loudly. And B) last week when the conservative government tried to use the bombings in Madrid to pillory their favorite target ETA despite all evidence pointing to others (stop me when you hear the coincidences) The Spanish people voted them out and voted in some Socialist! Some real honest to goodness Marxist! Could there be anything cooler, George Bush in his effort to cobble together a bullshit “coalition” ends up helping the Socialist in Spain get elected! Ronald Reagan would shit himself if he knew…or hadn’t already…today.
In case there isn’t enough modern irony in that for you consider that Moorish Spain had huge populations of Muslims, Jews and Catholics living in peace for over 200 years. But that was before religious extremists took over the government and started the inquisition.
For those of you who missed that day in school or were educated in Georgia the Inquisition was like the Passion meets Wrestlemania III at Joseph McCarthey’s house.
So this November if you really want to cast a protest vote forget that Ralph Nader crap and vote for a Socialist that’ll shake some shit up, mark my words. C’mon if the Spanish can do it, what’s the matter ya chicken?

Award season is fast approaching and not to be out done we here at Big News give out a weekly Golden Irony Award. This week’s recipient: The United States Military Reservation at Guantanimo Bay, Cuba.
Now this is a story that has virtually disappeared from the radar screen of the major media. Why? Well maybe, because it makes the United States look like scumbags.
Not like evil doer scumbags, but more like: Nice clean-cut fraternity boys who say Yes ma’am and no sir and just had a little too much to drink, you know like kids do, and that’s why they raped and sodomizied your daughter but they feel really bad about it (don’t you boys) kind of scumbags.
See if you can follow this. We don’t do business with Cuba because they’re communist, not the giving money to little old ladies so they don’t have to eat cat food social security kind. Real honest to goodness worker control the means of production kind. Is that the only reason? No. There are a bunch of reasons, don’t get me wrong Fidel Castro has a fairly well earned daughter sodomizing rep himself. But the oft-sighted reason for the embargo against Cuba is Human rights violations…you know like treating political prisoners unfairly.
Now I’m sure all of the three hundred “detainees” are guilty as sin. I mean they were hiding in the caves of Afghanistan. And MARINES apprehended them. Oh, I know what your thinking but these aren’t like the old, I flunked the civil service exam three times and now I have to go in the service or work at my cousin Fritz’s methamphetamine lab in South Dakota, THEY’VE GOT COMPUTERS NOW. (Nice and slow for irony) and hiding in caves is pretty shady to start with.
So if they’re guilty of plotting to overthrow the U.S. or they were shooting weapons at UN Soldiers why don’t we put them on trial, the Nazi’s got trials. And this is the best part ‘cause there in Cuba!, those damn Cubans! See we don’t own the military base at Guantanamo Bay Cuba we rent it! For a dollar a century and if it’s anything like our UN dues we’re probably waiting for Ted Turner to pay the bill. So due to a conveniently placed loophole, we can invoke the, “democracy does not exist in a vacuum clause” of the Constitution and leave people locked up indefinitely like hash smugglers in Turkey.
Democracy is a great idea let’s prove it to every one in the world by acting on it when it’s not convenient, when it might make us look weak, and when it may blow up in our faces. Because that’s bravery, not driving around in an SUV with a Fuck Saddam bumper sticker on the back.
So this weeks-Golden Irony Award goes to “Gitmo”