I Hate Hussain

Frank Herbert has LSD for blood...

Jack — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 21:09:00 GMT

Hussain loves the Dune series, by Frank Herbert. A lot. The more I read it, the more I realize that it's a formative influence on his whole entire shit. I was prepared to share in his enthusiasm after reading the first book, but then I had the misfortune of reading the next two (Dune Messiah and Children of Dune). Hussain seems to agree that these books try the patience, which is strange since he loves them, but he's an English Major, so maybe he enjoys books that feel like pulling teeth. Maybe thats a challenge or something. If that's the case, then he should read more Gene Wolfe, cause that dude is about as insane as Frank Herbert, but somehow a lot less intolerable.

In any case, I thought I would blog a Herbert simulation, which is basically exactly what the entire second half of Children of Dune sounds like:

Leto pressed his consciousness against the wall of voices that rose and fell like the fluttering froth of a roiled sea, and felt them give way to a new perception, a pleux d'gleubloix of half-truths, truths, and something beyond truth, which flitted at the edge of vision, like moths around a sietch glowglobe. For a moment, Leto drifted above this awareness, lost in the time-place, when he found himself plunging into a vision of a girl, making spice coffee, sitting on a spice mat, surrounded by spice cushions and old spice receipts from past spicy spice purchases. The melange seemed to be everywhere, part of everything, past-present, present-past, now-past, now-now, and now-past-present now. Beyond her the emerald waving of pampas grass was dappled with a silver dusting of sunlight, as she gazed out over the open bled, which I always italicize for reasons that only the spice trance can possibly fucking explain. She sang to herself, another one of those tuneless, totally impossible to imagine songs that are sprinkled throughout this series.

I come to you my love
Dying as we did live
Beside the pampas grass

And you did grind the beans
Like so many lives reclaimed
Beside the pampas grass

And this adds nothing to the story
Nor explains any of the trippy bullshit I've been inflicting on you for going on five hundred pages
Beside the pampas grass

Once again the inner memories washed over Leto's consciousness and spun him around, bubbles seething across his eyes, and leaving him deposited back on the open bled. His mouth felt dry, and the flinty smell of sand, mixed with the cinnamon scent of melange greeted him. His eyes tracked along the rock formation that the Fremen called Quirz al-Ashemmi in the old tongue, which meant “more Arabic sounding bullshit,” but when said with a Choksoba lilt, and the twist of eyebrow which implied that one was speaking to a nephew or first cousin in a situation involving three legged seating accomodations, such as a stool, or low backed chair, it would mean “the same rock formation I've mentioned several times previously, but you don't know why.”

Abruptly, the presence of the lumpen Gurney Halleck conjoined itself with Leto's awareness, and the inkvine scar on his jaw writhed like Shai-hulud as he spoke. “It's page 475, child. Don't you think it's time you proved to me that there's at least some semblance of a plot to this book, or some point to the parched expanse of hallucinations and meaninglessness you've made me sit through?” His hand crept to his crysknife in a way that would imply tension, if you had any idea what in holy hell was going on.

In that moment, with Gurney impatiently checking his chronothopter, it all became clear to Leto. Time wasn't a dimension at all, but a perception of all things equivocal and impermanent, as those things interpose themselves on a backdrop of the self, the spice, the now. The now, as a representation of the self, which for Leto was a many-self, a composite of past selves, numerous to innumerability, but captured in one friendly liege, known only as Huflungpoo. And so it was then that Leto knew he was ready to proceed the plot, at long last, so we can stop wasting our time in this ridiculous peyote fueled vision quest. He turned a smiling, sun blushed face up to Gurney.

“You think me a child? I am so much more. I am the memories of the past, the vision of the future, the incredible disinterest of the now. Gurney! Gurney! Can you see the gift I will give to you? The possibilities I remove and the probabilities I create? Now, quickly, my old friend, old self, let's have a strange non-conversation, in which you use your knife as a visual aid to convey the fine line I'm walking with my words, and the tension of this scene which can only be appreciated by the drug addled mind which authored it!”

Halleck's hand tensed on his crysknife, and he withdrew it enough that Leto could see the sun glinting from a hair's breadth of worm tooth. “Watch what you say,” Gurney growled, “my loyalty is with the Lady Jessica, and I'm going to respond aggressively to the nonsense you just barfed up.”

Leto smoothed the sand at his side, felt its flinty taste at the back of his pallete, caught up a handfull and let if fall between his fingers. “Time, Gurney. Like sand. Like water. Like spice. J'ete plus de les stylo sur la table! Plus de les stylos! That was French Gurney. And in italics. I know now how to advance the plot, Gurney. Indicate a reduction in tension, again via your kife.”

Gurney seemed satisfied, and the glint of wormtooth disappeared. “Aye, lad, I'm a warrior and a lutemaster. But I play the lute a ton, and never ever fight. Now speak the words I need to hear in order to advance the plot.”

Leto dusted his hands on his thighs, and let understanding come to him. PSYCHE! He didn't understand it at all! Back to acid trip! If you skip ahead, you might miss something that explains why Hussain likes this crap! And then you'd also have wasted your time, because you missed the point! So, next paragraph, sucker! You lose, acid wins!

Leto felt his conscious slip parallel to the timeflow, but outside it, watching a million Gurney Hallecks, a million possible outcomes, so many resulting in a crysknife, point first buried under his chin, so many terrible purposes, like the spice threads on a sietch loom, clattering and scraping against one another, terrifying Leto with their persistance, their certainty, their impossibility. Leto felt the father-presence rise up to him, dark and warm, comforting him. Use caution, my son. The paths are many, and singular. Never forget that inner voices use italics, and not quotes, as it was decreed by Ibn Harq.

Gurney Halleck watched the child's eyes roll back in his head, and blew out a disgusted snort. “I'm going to go play Gears of War, this is fucking bullshit.”

Hussain Says "Bittersweet"

Jack — Sat, 07 May 2005 13:58:00 GMT

Quoth The English Major: “I've been meaning to catch up on a list of movies I haven't seen, but it's bittersweet - at some point, my list won't overlap with anyones.”

How are you gonna use “bittersweet” in that context, dude? How are you ever going to be happy in this life if you keep using words like “bittersweet?” Men don't experience emotions that fall outside of the set of “psyched” and “pissed.” Those are the two male emotions. If you're a really sensitive, emotionally developed male, you might be able to tack “fuckin” on the front, thus opening you up to the possibility of “fuckin psyched” and “fuckin pissed.”

But “bittersweet,” dude? Save that for female fiction writers and The Verve. It's not for men. Not only does it fall outside the range of “psyched” and “pissed,” but it's actually two adjectives at once, which is a degree of complexity that no man should ever experience, much less acknowledge.

What makes this matter worse, is that you're suggesting a “bittersweet” state has occurred because you don't have the same unseen movie list as other people. This situaiton would best be described as “fuckin irrelevant,” but you have chosen to stretch it to fit a “bittersweet” in there. It's one thing to hum along with The Verve's lyrics, it's another thing to go out looking for ways to find “bittersweetnaz” in your own life.

Everyone wants you to find “fuckin psychedness” Hussain, but this can never happen if you keep this shit up.

Ian Forces Me to Resarch...

Jack — Tue, 22 Feb 2005 15:44:00 GMT

"That those were Reagan and Bush years doesn't bother you at all, and that those Republican Administrations didn't take any significant action to stop them doesn't hit your radar screen."

And I'm the partisan one? Jeez.

First off, let's not forget that we're talking about the DPRK. Lying, sneaking, backing out of treaties, blackmailing and threats are what they're all about. On some level it is inevitable that they would someday get nuclear weapons.

link: http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/northkorea/nuclear.html

"On Dec. 12, 1985, Pyongyang signed the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Treaty."

"North and South Korea signed the Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula later that year. Both sides promised, 'not to test, manufacture, produce, receive, possess, store, deploy or use nuclear weapons.' They also agreed not to possess nuclear reprocessing and uranium enrichment facilities."

"North Korea signed the IAEA safeguards agreement on Jan. 30, 1992, and ratified it four months later."

Since you appear to think Clinton "took significant action" I have to assume you define this as "getting the DPRK to sign treaties they don't intend to obey." Based on the quotes above, you can see that Reagan and Bush got them to sign lots and lots of shit, and at no point did they have to build any reactors for them in order to do it. The closest they came, was agreeing to let the Russians help them, which they'd been doing without our permission for years anyway.

Also noteworthy: "[The DPRK] asked for permission to receive assistance from the Soviets in the construction of four light water reactors to replace the graphite facilities at Yongbyon."

You suggest that graphite reactors are better for the production of weapons grade plutonium than light water reactors. All the sources I have read agree with this in principle... However it is odd that the DRPK would request to convert over to light water reactors. It becomes less odd when one reads this link. The relevant quote: “[W]hile light water reactors are not an ideal method for nuclear proliferation, they're an ideal method for HIDING nuclear proliferation, if you want the bomb but do not want to raise alarm bells.” So what do we have? We have the DPRK looking to replace older, less reliable, less capable reactors with modern, politcally correct models. The fact that they're requesting it means it's in their interests. It's not like Bill Clinton bamboozled them with some LWRs and they were like “herro? Wait a meenit heah! Dees reactah not make-uh prutonium!” Clinton basically gave them what they wanted.

To be fair, though, the LWRs Clinton promised have not been built. While he did cave in, he did it in typically Clintonian fashion, and ultimately gave them nothing, besides a whole lot of fuel oil, grain, etc.

“Research reactors = DPRK scientists trying to figure out the best hardware configurations to do gaseous diffusion on uranium fuel rods.“

Urk? Gaseous diffusion is used to increase the concentration of U235 before the fuel rods are assembled. The element used in nuclear weapons is plutonium, not uranium. It's unclear to me what method the DPRK used to obtain the plutonium needed to create weapons, but it seems that it would have to be from Russian supplied sources.

“Again, that there were any benefits at all to the 1994 agreement, you absolutely refuse to acknowledge.”

Actually I that's true. Seems to me like we spent a bunch of time and money on it, and it got us nothing at all. They have nukes, we gave them lots of oil, not much accomplished. I had thought, mistakenly, that the LWRs Clinton agreed to give them were actually running, and useful to their construction of nuclear weapons. I still think he was wrong to agree to build the LWRs, unless he really intended not to follow through, and instead to play DPRK-like games with the DPRK. If that's what his plan was, it's actually quite good.

Hussain's Punishment...

Jack — Tue, 04 Jan 2005 10:26:00 GMT

So, clearly I haven't been blogging much lately. I'm not sure what my problem is, it most likely relates to the fact that my boss doesn't like me goofing off at work, and when I'm at home I have a busy schedule of WOW and book research to do, but I have to blog this...

Right now, Hussain is in the Bahamas, buying weed off the locals, and getting even more brown. I was suspicious that this was a foul deed on his part, since Munk and I have been WOWing away while his faggy Iranian girl-Paladin languishes at a pitiful level 15, thus creating a really annoying level discrepancy for us to overcome. Munk's Welsh priest, Amarydd, is level 21, and my mage, Guostav, is level 23. By the time that fuckin ripper gets back from vacation, we'll probably have passed his original character, Tsienne, as well.

But all that is digression. I knew Hussain's trip had angered the gods when I drove into work today, and heard Marc Maron announce his guest co-host on Morning Sedition, Mr. Anthony Lappe, from the Guerrilla News Network. Hussain loves getting more angles on shit like that, and so he was sorely punished for his selfish caribbean cavorting by missing the show.

In practice, Lappe was really pretty mundane and predictable. He had the standard radio-liberal voice, a little too youthful sounding for all the decisive and derisive opinions he was chucking around, and lots of laughs at all the obvious evils of the world. He was very upset with all the mercenary groups in Iraq right now, who he feels are war profiteers, completely ignoring the fact that mercenaries, by definition, are war profiteers. Beyond that, he really didn't have much to say, certainly nothing worthy of the madness I witnessed over the years at GNN, but then again he was always a voice of faggy reason relative to the borderline personalities that populated GNN.

The only really exceptional part of the show was when some guest Maron had on, some guy who had written about the end of cheap oil, started them all out on bashing “the suburbs.” It was a really exceptional degree of hate and loathing those guys put on display, made all the more exceptional by the pride and self-congratulation they seemed to think their insights merited. To paraphrase, after Maron says something about how all condos are the same, the guest (whom I'm not even interested enough in to look up his name) basically says something like “well, there's many villages in Tuscany that look the same, but the point is they're all excellent in the same way, whereas the suburbs are all horrible in the same way, and are terrible places to live, and totally dehumanizing and designed to steal from the middle class.” Just spectacular levels of elitism and hypocritical bullshit.

And Hussain missed it all.

Silver Lessons of Hussain...

Jack — Wed, 01 Dec 2004 14:28:00 GMT

The most important thing to know about Hussain, is you have to give his gay crap a chance. A lot of the time he will foist some ridiculous crap on me, and want me to pay attention to it, and it turns out to be a totally crappy waste of time and I hate him for it. But you can't just discount the stuff he presents, because you might end up missing out on a Silver Lesson. I spent about 20 minutes trudging through this insane cockfestival, before Hussain finally presented the Silver Lesson.

The link: Silver Excerpt as read by Gola Wolf Richards.

Now, let's not get ahead of ourselves. While the MP3 is loading into your browers, please take a moment to note the shitty, 1996-ish qualities of the site, as well as the flowing mane on Christopher M. Hunt. Is it me, or do all these new age cockjobs have the same improbable hair-thing going on? Voluminous red locks, handlebar moustache, huge grin... It's bizzare. But Hunt is the the magic man. The Wolf is where the magic is. His magic is so great, his lessons so silvery, that Cameron knew of him long ago. Cameron's model new age hippie was named “Swami Richard,” the ponytailed huckster, who used flowery gibberish to score with college freshmen. Now, Gola Wolf Richards may not have any hair, but boy howdy does Christopher M. Hunt, and good fucking lord, folks, the man's name is “Richards.” The dead Chinaman was on the money.

Now, let's get to the Silver Lesson. Listen to that shit now, and absorb it. Then come back...

Ok. Great, huh? Let's enjoy together. First off, Gola starts out by saying “speak to edify, not to mystify.” That's how he introduces the insane stream of babble that follows. Now, this whole thing is about “self cultivation based on whole, sage perspectives.” Or maybe it's “(W)hole® sage perspectives.” Regardless, it's sage, and it involves perspectives, that much is clear.

As a service to you, the three or four people that read my blog, I have actually gone and transcribed this bad motherfucker for your reading pleasure...

My name is Gola Wolf Richards, and when I was a boy, my father quoted from the old testament, saying, “speak to edify, not to mystify.” Yet oddly and mysteriously enough, in order to increase profound understanding the thoughtful initiation of many practical judgements depends on symbolic reflections. By concisely clustering multiple ideas and feelings in unison, symbols can effectively suggest larger perspectives for contemplating principles for global citizenship, for self-cultivation based on whole, sage perspectives, for superior human development and whole, sage perspectives for health for sustainable life on earth. When symbolic language is used for universal conflict resolution, unwobbling pivots can be established for a world in crisis. Therefore Silver Lessons For Superior Global Citizenship is an audio essay for conflict resolution evolved through profound contemplation. In response to the world's needs for timeliness and integrity it offers insights to combat universal chaos with whole, sage perspectives. Using just a few incisive statements to address entire spectrums of human complications for thousands of years, from Grimm's Fairy Tales, to Confucious, to Aesop, to Ben Franklin, universal truths have been stated in symbolic language. Likewise, for multiple dimensions of human development Silver Lessons brings global dimensions of individuality into central view and based on universal principles for understanding individual and global conflict resolution, Silver Lessons offsets shallow, less-than-whole potentials in human experience using a little, to say a lot for the good of humanity in general. Therefore, equipped with principles to heal perspectives to realize peace and a sustainable environment, Silver Lessons is offered to effectively educate for global change. Consequently, so long as we never hold growth hostage to how we believe, but learn to believe such that growth is ensured, humanity can effectively reform conflict, by learning how to contemplate for conflict resolution. My name is Gola Wolf Richards and I authored Silver Lessons For Superior Global Citizenship. I am a teacher and Dean of Contemplative Education at MottoCitizens.com a secular seminary for the contemplation of whole, sage perspectives at m-o-t-t-o citizens dot com, in [unintelligable], space, and the universe.

Now I have to analyze. We start off with the admonition to “edify, not to mystify” and then we descend into utterly mystifying gibberish. When you juxtapose that intro with what follows, you really have to start wondering if this is parody. I'm going to guess that it's not, since this guy apparently paid for ad time on AirAmerica radio, and people generally don't spend money on parody, even crazy people with strange D+D character names. So one has to assume that this guy thinks that his sermon really is pegged on “edify” on the “edify to mystify” slider. He sounds genuinely proud of his success in this task, when he smugly proclaims that his audio essay 'uses a little to say a lot,” completely ignoring the painful reality of the situation. For example, what do we call it when somebody says “Yet oddly and mysteriously enough, blah blah blah blah?” We call that 'wordiness.'

I am not one to let mystification stand in the way of my edification, however. Based on numerous readings of this madness, my best paraphrasing is this: Symbolism can describe a better world, I do that in this thing I'm selling, and I do a good job. That's really it, but in the name of edification Gola has built an edifice of words, with a throne atop it for him to sit on. His fundamental point, like all stupid hippies, is “let's just get along.” That's what he's talking about when he refers to using “just a few incisive statements to address entire spectrums of human complications for thousands of years.” It's just his zen version of “come oooooon.” Only he thinks it's so damned revolutionary, that it needs an audio essay, and a great pyramid-like mound of words to do it justice.

I dunno, Swami Richards... Me no rikey!

Now That The Election's Over....

Jack — Fri, 19 Nov 2004 16:13:00 GMT

...it's ok to start noticing what a corrupt, ineffectual, generally bullshit organization the UN is.

Look at what has befallen Hussain's number one boyfriend, UN Secretary General Kofi “Salt n' Peppah” Annan. It's really too bad that we couldn't have had this story in the news at the same time John Kerry was talking about “bringing our allies to our side,” because it'd be really fucking fun to watch him try to explain how that's possible, when “our allies” are busy giving Saddam money under the table, trying to circumvent their own sanctions, so Iraq could give cash rewards to Palestinian suicide bombers.

Regardless, now that the “conservative media” has failed to get Kerry elected, they're forced to cover the Oil For Food scandal, and the UN is starting to try to pick its scapegoat. Since Annan is black, he's a great choice. Haha! No, seriously I have to assume that since he was chosen to lead the UN, and the UN is a bunch of douchebags, then he is pretty much the douchiest guy they could line up. It certainly is nice that they're gonna get rid of his stupid ass, but I think it's just a dodge, as they'll choose some other sweet talking fuckbasket and this one will play it a little closer to the vest. If you make your corruption only semi-transparent, instead of completely transparent, that will be enough for the plausibly deniability the “conservative media” needs to ignore the fact that you're just an American-hating genocide referee.

So, have fun falling on the sword, Kofi. You're a sack of crap, but you're a fun sack of crap to have around, and I will miss you.

World of Warcraft...

Jack — Mon, 15 Nov 2004 11:57:00 GMT

The link: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/

Hussain forced me to play the open beta test for World of Warcraft, and now I'm all excited about it. Unfortunately, Blizzard says they won't let players roll their characters over from the beta to the official game, which means that any time I spend playing the game now will be wasted. Since MMORPGs are all about spending time, I've committed to not playing the beta and waiting for the final release on 11/23, so that all my time investment goes to advancing a cool character along. Unfortunately, this is killing me, since the game is mindless fun, and I want to play it right now.

I've even lost focus on Half-Life 2, which is coming out tomorrow, and I suppose I will want to play. I've enjoyed messing around with the Hammer Editor, which is what Valve uses to make their maps. This image is a pretty cool example of their level design methodology, and it makes me want to build a map using similar tricks.

Now, after making me play the beta and get all excited, Hussain informs me that he won't be playing World of Warcraft, because he has “too much stuff to do.” In Hashemite-ese “too much stuff to do” means “nothing to actually do, besides sit around lamenting the fact that you haven't written the great American novel.” It also apparently involves taking twist-ties, making them into spirals, and throwing them somewhere close enough for the cat to see, but still ignore. Also, lots of laser pointers. Not one horizontal surface should be bereft of a laser pointer, lest an opportunity be missed to play with the cat. Long story short, the cat is very important, the great American novel is very important, let's all think about that.

Slate...

Jack — Wed, 27 Oct 2004 15:01:00 GMT

The link: http://slate.msn.com/id/2108714/

Just in case you didn't believe me that the Slate is liberal, check that shit out. Hus sent me this link, I started reading through it and commenting on it to him, and in doing so I realized there's enough pockets of rarified opinion in there, it demands comment.

Arnovitz: “I'll pull the lever for Kerry, if for nothing else than to defeat the misconception that being contemplative is somehow paralyzing.” >> I can't fathom how Kerry manages to convince intelligent people that he's 'contemplative.' They seem to mistake his lack of a position for a position so sophisticated, it's hard to pin down. Kerry is really everything wrong with a politician, rolled into a single package. He's a chameleon on the issues, willing to agree with everyone at once, take every side of every issue, and then pretend to be consistent and firm. Nobody is claiming that being contemplative is paralyzing. They're saying the guy isn't contemplative, he's deliberately motionless, and he pretends to it's cause he's busy thinking. If you never move in a given direction, nobody can object to where you're going.

Arnovitz: “Watching the president of the United States, the one person in our country whose endorsement can legitimate any initiative, use gay people as a political chew-toy to advance some kind of theological agenda has been the most infuriating and surreal political experience of my citizen life.” >> Hussain says it's not about the issues, and I have to agree, based on this nonsense. Bush's stance is no on gay marriage, yes on civil unions. This is a divergence from the Republican party platform, which is no on both. It's also the exact same stance Kerry holds on the issue. Yet somehow Arnovitz thinks Bush is 'using gay people as a political chew-toy,' and Kerry/Edwards of “Dick Cheney's Gay Daughter” fame, are not. What fucking planet do you live on, guy?

Berman: “But Bush has got to be the most ham-handed president in American history. He is incompetent even at expressing whatever is valid in his larger worldview.” >> This guy has his head on straight. He's voting for Kerry, which is a shame, but at least he's smart enough to be objective about what Bush is about, what he can do, what he can't do, and what his real failings are. Anybody who actually knows anything about Bush's strategy for fighting terrorism knows that it's going well, that it was really his best option, and is consistently dumbfounded by how hard it is for him to explain. Considering that's really his main job, I can't see why it's not being handled. For Berman, I guess that's a deal breaker. For me, it's just strange and disappointing, but I don't need to be spoonfed the truth, so I forgive it.

Blodget: “Kerry : Not perfect, but 'reality-based.'” >> Huh? Reality? Like the totally realistic assumption that France is going to rush to his aid because he's a nice guy? How can people associate Kerry with reality?

Boutin: “So I'll take a chance on Kerry, but if he wins I'll skip the victory party. Too many of his supporters have proven as divisive, dishonest, and hateful as they imagine their bogeyman Karl Rove to be.” >> Yup. Personally I think that the Democrat's assault on the Oval Office has sent new records for brazen disrespect of America, and the office of the President. I definitely lay blame on guys like Ken Starr, and other Republicans who got the whole “disrespect for the President” train rolling, but even after it was obvious that this sorta shit was damaging for the nation, and not productive, the Democrats took it to brand new levels, and with a four month interruption after 9-11, they haven't stopped attacking since.

Carter: “When you pour billions into homeland security without achieving a significant net gain in security, I think there's a problem.” >> I hear this line over and over, and it never ceases to infuriate me. Has there been another attack since 9-11? In over three years? No. So what the fuck are you talking about? Now, I'm not about to run around claiming that America is definitely more secure. I don't really know. But to confidently state that we're not any more secure? Based on what, exactly? Based on the fact that the OHS hasn't cut down on the rate of baseless assertions? Shit, dude, it's like Smokey the Bear says “only you can prevent yourself from spewing fabricated bullshit.”

Curtis: “If Bush wins Tuesday, I'll tip my wide-brimmed hat to Karl Rove, the über-operative, who will have successfully turned two well-credentialed U.S. senators into liars, war criminals, or both.” >> Really? So John Kerry didn't violate the UCMJ when he met with the North Vietnamese in Paris? John Edwards wasn't an ambulance chasing trial lawyer, who earned multi-multi-millions off junk science? There's nothing amazing about Rove, in fact I have to bet the guy was amazed by just how easy the Democratic primaries decided to make his job. God forbid the Dems nominate somebody like Wesley Clark, who isn't a demonstrable traitor... Then Rove might have had to actually do some work.

Fritz: “If Bush gets re-elected, I might have to change citizenship and move to another country.” >> Promises, promises, promises. You've got a good last name for it, buddy. I hear North Korea is beautiful in the early fall.

Kenner: “The simple fact is that [Bush] is the only candidate who has had the courage to envision a long-term solution to the danger of terrorism—the liberalization and democratization of the Middle East. John Kerry, on the other hand, cannot manage to think beyond the next political obstacle.” Leave it to the fucking intern to have a more mature view of this election than any of the “talent.” There's a couple things I look for to determine if somebody has got a fucking clue or not. A big one is whether or not they understand the strategic vision behind the invasion of Iraq. All you really need to gain this knowledge is to have a clue, or at least to be willing to pay Stratfor to give you one. Kenner has this clue, and sadly, most of his well-paid bosses don't. Oh well, I'm sure they'll trade him a staff position for his promise to stop thinking too much. He even sees what's really behind the “flip-flop” moniker. Kerry's vision is so shortsighted, he just lives from debate, to TV spot, to stump speech. He'll say whatever the shifting political winds suggest, and hope nobody ties to reconcile it all later.

Noah: “Sen. John Kerry is the least appealing candidate the Democrats have nominated for president in my lifetime. I'm 46, so that covers Kennedy, Johnson, Humphrey, McGovern, Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Clinton, and Gore.” >> I just love this quote. It's really dead on, too. I always bring this up to dad when he gets pissed at Bush. You've got to love how the Dems rose to the occasion and put this fucking schmuck forward. Even his own people know he's an asshole. Or, as Noah says, “He's pompous, he's an opportunist, and he's indecisive. Although I'm impressed by Kerry's combat record in Vietnam, I can't suppress the uncharitable suspicion that what drew him there wasn't patriotism so much as a preppy passion for physical challenge and the urge to buff his future political resume.” Yup. Although, I'm not sure what's so impressive about 4 months and a ticket home based on bogus purple hearts.

Powell: “Bush and Co. stole the 2000 election. Bush lied to the country about WMD in Iraq. He ordered an attack on a sovereign nation, ignoring the United Nations. As I write this, 1,109 American soldiers are dead. Thousands of innocent Iraqi men, women, and children are dead.” >> The “art guy” should probably stick to art. At this point I'm less offended that he's buying the parroted party line, than that he really thinks it needs to be parroted again. “Bush lied, kids died!” Shut up, dude. We've found mass graves filled with Saddam's victims. He killed hundreds of thousands of his own people. His war with Iran killed millions. There's no comparison. Get some fucking perspective, you infant.

Stamaty: “Because I believe Bush is arrogant, ill-informed, reckless, and politically uncompassionate and unwise in his policies that favor the rich and ignore many important concerns.” >> Another “illustrator.” Apprently illustrating is very time consuming, and leaves you only a few spare moments to assimilate the DNC party line, before scribbling more carricatures of Bush drinking oil, or something.

Weisberg: “I remain totally unimpressed by John Kerry. Outside of his opposition to the death penalty, I've never seen him demonstrate any real political courage. His baby steps in the direction of reform liberalism during the 1990s were all followed by hasty retreats. His Senate vote against the 1991 Gulf War demonstrates an instinctive aversion to the use of American force, even when it's clearly justified. Kerry's major policy proposals in this campaign range from implausible to ill-conceived. He has no real idea what to do differently in Iraq. His health-care plan costs too much to be practical and conflicts with his commitment to reducing the deficit. At a personal level, he strikes me as the kind of windbag that can only emerge when a naturally pompous and self-regarding person marinates for two decades inside the U.S. Senate. If elected, Kerry would probably be a mediocre, unloved president on the order of Jimmy Carter. And I won't have a second's regret about voting for him. Kerry's failings are minuscule when weighed against the massive damage to America's standing in the world, our economic future, and our civic institutions that would likely result from a second Bush term.” >> ABB, baby. I just love this shit.

Hussain Chinoy : Brown Bowler Hat

Jack — Thu, 21 Oct 2004 14:45:00 GMT

Word of the day: unequivocably.

I was listening to Rush, and he played a sound byte from Kerry back in '94. Quoting the Washington Post (that's Post, Ian, you fucking commie): “In 1994, discussing the possibility of U.S. troops being killed in Bosnia, he said, 'If you mean dying in the course of the United Nations effort, yes, it is worth that. If you mean dying American troops unilaterally going in with some false presumption that we can affect the outcome, the answer is unequivocally no.'"

In this transcription, they spell it “unequivocally,” which is how I thought the word was spelled and pronounced. Hearing the sound byte, though, Kerry pretty clearly says “unequivocably” which made me say to myself “hey, that's not right, is it?” So, I went to dictionary.com, and checked it out. They don't think it's a word. I then commented on this to Hussain, and he started getting Bowler Hat with me. Witness:

Phryxis2002: John Kerry just said "unequivocably" in a sound byte Rush played.
HussainC: wrt
Phryxis2002: WRT it's not a word and he thinks it is, apparently.
HussainC: http://www.webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?va=unequivocably
HussainC: i would like you to blog those last four lines. your dad'll get a kick out of it.

I'm not going to bother reprinting it here, but take my word that Hussain then spent the next few minutes being all snide about how I don't check my sources, how dictionary.com is apparently the online reference equivalent to Alex Jones, etc. He's very proud of his Merriam-Webster lookup, and how it says “unequivocably“ is a word. He mocks me for only having one source, and then he counts himself a fucking genius for doing the same thing. Unfortunately for him, while he was busy patting himself on the back for being Snarkmeister Numero Uno, I had some time to research this further. Nobody besides Hussain's boyfriends at Merriam-Webster thinks “unequivocably“ is a word. As I already pointed out, dictionary.com doesn't. Neither does MS Word. Nor does yourDictionary.com. Nor does the Cambridge Online Dictionary. Nor does MSN Encarta online dictionary. Nor HyperDictionary. None of them. Even the communists over at Merriam-Webster, despite their fervent desire to be inclusive to all words, no matter how fucked up, have to admit that this a “nonstandard” form of the word “unequivocally.” It would seem that when our vision is not blocked by the brim of our Bowler Hat, that Merriam-Webster is really the Alex Jones of online dictionaries, and Hussain, his boyfriend John Kerry, and everyone else who thinks repeatedly mispronouncing a word makes it right can unequivocably suck my balls. Especiably Hussain, who is fantasticably gay, and indescribababably foppish.

Halloweeny Puppy...

Jack — Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:36:00 GMT

Technically Captain is over a year old now, but since we had to wait until he was a week old to get him, he wasn't around for Halloween. This year will be his first, and since our relationship with Captain is very love/hate, it goes without saying that we will take this opportunity to humiliate him.

Here's Hussain's suggestion. I like it a lot, but I fear that this costume would be too easily removed and chewed up. That is, in fact, the primary challenge when selecting a costume for a Firedog. I like this one, too.

Wheeee!