Monday, June 30, 2008
More Thoughts on Obombanation
If one good thing has come of the Barack Obama campaign it is the endless stream of comedy. No, not from him, he is sobering enough, but from the sincerity of his true believers. As I've been saying for months, his movement has all the hallmarks of a cult. Today I found a new blog on Obama. It's a riot! Go here for more.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
The Puritan Problem
Some of my earliest memories include a pair of Superman underoos and a homemade red cape my mother made. I would wear these two things and nothing else. Jumping over tables and off swing sets, running from room to room guided by my fist, these were my first memories of finding a good pair of underwear.
For this reason I stayed firmly committed to briefs. Boxers were still unknown to this boy of nine. When I began middle school back in ’88 as a boy of 11, I did what all young men do—delved into boxer shorts, deodorant too. Briefs were for sissies and geeks; boxers were for aspiring playas.
Secretly, though, I quickly tired of boxers. No active young man has any business wearing the things, anyway, for no other reason than their scrunching—defined as the gravitational pull toward one’s delicate parts or the thong tendency. Go to gym class, walk the halls, sit up, sit down, and by the end of the day one can model for Frederick’s, so severe is the scrunching, which requires constant picking.
I always saw the whole “freedom” and “need to breathe” arguments for boxers as overrated and easily outweighed by the scrunching factor. Plus, they’re hardly elastic. A funny slide, a long stride, an awkward twist—these things can lead to a crotch tear.
Still, I spent most of my later formative years bouncing back and forth between boxers and briefs. For a time I went through the silk phase—silk sheets, silk robes, and silk boxers. The sheets are overrated, more for show if anything; the boxers, while having fine prints such as an angry Taz bursting from the behind, hearts, or smoking guns for the front, are far from durable. They also lose that smooth silky texture fairly soon.
So I sighed and went back to briefs as the lesser of two evils (Yes, I know that is the very opposite of my non-voting logic. But hey, with voting I have a choice, to vote or not to vote. Underwear is nonnegotiable. No “free-balling” or “commando” here. Heard too many zipper horror stories.).
Then, several years ago—when exactly? I don’t know—my situation took a dramatic turn for the better. The best of both boxers and briefs were combined into the “boxer briefs,” a brilliant invention. Much of the western world has discovered the virtues of the boxer briefs as well. Wikipedia has this to say: “The underwear preference among American, Australian, British, Canadian and French teenagers today is leaning toward boxer briefs, probably because of their proximity to both briefs and boxer shorts.” Well duh. One wonders why it took so long for underwear producers to market such a thing.
I view underwear the same way I view cars: reliability is numero uno. Washing them seasonally and filling them up with gas are important too. Sure, a decent feature now and then is nice—such as a paisley print or a sunroof. But overall, the proverbial “from point A to point B” trumps all. The more reliable a thing, the less thought one gives it. With Hanes or Fruit of the Loom this has been my general experience. And that was that.
Until a couple of months ago when I went to Wal-Mart to buy a few more pair. They were all fairly similar with some modest variations. I chose a set of Puritans. Since I’ve been satisfied with the Puritan dress shirt I’ve had for the past couple years, I considered the underwear brand change a nonissue. Silly idea.
It took no more than a couple days before I noticed a problem. The open groin section in the front had a serious overlap deficiency. Ladies, this may seem a foreign language, but hear me out. Learn a little. Every fellow or whore knows the arrangement. There is first the right side which covers most of the area in question. The left side sits on top, leaving significant overlap and protection of cloth. That should be the end of the matter.
Puritans, however, are very conservative with the overlap; there can’t be more than an inch. Hence the problem—the constant peaking out of one’s parts. Running on my treadmill in Puritans is always interesting. Going to work in them is not. I suppose it could be a size issue as some beasts cannot be tamed. I’m open to suggestions.
Overall, not a good buy. Men, I’d stay away from Puritans. Pervs and male prostitutes, I give you your niche.
Oh, by the way, anyone else find it a little curious that Puritans, of all things, make for easy sin?
For this reason I stayed firmly committed to briefs. Boxers were still unknown to this boy of nine. When I began middle school back in ’88 as a boy of 11, I did what all young men do—delved into boxer shorts, deodorant too. Briefs were for sissies and geeks; boxers were for aspiring playas.
Secretly, though, I quickly tired of boxers. No active young man has any business wearing the things, anyway, for no other reason than their scrunching—defined as the gravitational pull toward one’s delicate parts or the thong tendency. Go to gym class, walk the halls, sit up, sit down, and by the end of the day one can model for Frederick’s, so severe is the scrunching, which requires constant picking.
I always saw the whole “freedom” and “need to breathe” arguments for boxers as overrated and easily outweighed by the scrunching factor. Plus, they’re hardly elastic. A funny slide, a long stride, an awkward twist—these things can lead to a crotch tear.
Still, I spent most of my later formative years bouncing back and forth between boxers and briefs. For a time I went through the silk phase—silk sheets, silk robes, and silk boxers. The sheets are overrated, more for show if anything; the boxers, while having fine prints such as an angry Taz bursting from the behind, hearts, or smoking guns for the front, are far from durable. They also lose that smooth silky texture fairly soon.
So I sighed and went back to briefs as the lesser of two evils (Yes, I know that is the very opposite of my non-voting logic. But hey, with voting I have a choice, to vote or not to vote. Underwear is nonnegotiable. No “free-balling” or “commando” here. Heard too many zipper horror stories.).
Then, several years ago—when exactly? I don’t know—my situation took a dramatic turn for the better. The best of both boxers and briefs were combined into the “boxer briefs,” a brilliant invention. Much of the western world has discovered the virtues of the boxer briefs as well. Wikipedia has this to say: “The underwear preference among American, Australian, British, Canadian and French teenagers today is leaning toward boxer briefs, probably because of their proximity to both briefs and boxer shorts.” Well duh. One wonders why it took so long for underwear producers to market such a thing.
I view underwear the same way I view cars: reliability is numero uno. Washing them seasonally and filling them up with gas are important too. Sure, a decent feature now and then is nice—such as a paisley print or a sunroof. But overall, the proverbial “from point A to point B” trumps all. The more reliable a thing, the less thought one gives it. With Hanes or Fruit of the Loom this has been my general experience. And that was that.
Until a couple of months ago when I went to Wal-Mart to buy a few more pair. They were all fairly similar with some modest variations. I chose a set of Puritans. Since I’ve been satisfied with the Puritan dress shirt I’ve had for the past couple years, I considered the underwear brand change a nonissue. Silly idea.
It took no more than a couple days before I noticed a problem. The open groin section in the front had a serious overlap deficiency. Ladies, this may seem a foreign language, but hear me out. Learn a little. Every fellow or whore knows the arrangement. There is first the right side which covers most of the area in question. The left side sits on top, leaving significant overlap and protection of cloth. That should be the end of the matter.
Puritans, however, are very conservative with the overlap; there can’t be more than an inch. Hence the problem—the constant peaking out of one’s parts. Running on my treadmill in Puritans is always interesting. Going to work in them is not. I suppose it could be a size issue as some beasts cannot be tamed. I’m open to suggestions.
Overall, not a good buy. Men, I’d stay away from Puritans. Pervs and male prostitutes, I give you your niche.
Oh, by the way, anyone else find it a little curious that Puritans, of all things, make for easy sin?
Friday, June 27, 2008
Obombanation
Sometime in November 2006 I took a business trip to Arlington, Virginia, for a night. When I got to the hotel I turned on the TV, just to unwind a minute as little good can come from such an exercise. I flipped around until I came across a C-SPAN program that caught my attention. It was about the excitement being generated around some silver-tongued, underdog, Illinois politician named Barack Obama.
The reason why it caught my eye was because the last time some silver-tongued, underdog, Illinois politician rose up from nowhere America suffered its greatest calamity. But there was more. People were smiling and wetting themselves to his words. They were flocking from near and far to hear his sermons. "He's so different," they said. Some unwashed mass even proclaimed, "I haven't felt this excited since Jack Kennedy." It was then that I knew this Obama person was a fraud, a bamboozler. You see, friend, I trust most of my fellow citizens—well, the 1/3 of them who vote, anyway; the smarter majority long ago left the business of voting—to make the tough political decisions. I do. I trust them to make the right idiotic choices and to be the biggest suckers in the room, for they are always ripe for a savior.
I gave little thought about Mr. Obama until I heard he would be running for president. Not long after that I was coming back to Baltimore from another business trip in D.C. On the train was an attractive—liberal minded—20-something girl reading a book called The Audacity of Hope. Pictured along such highfalutin lingua was a grinning Barack Obama. Which was yet further evidence that he was a phony. Because having an American politician offer us commoners thoughts of real hope is like a pious virgin preaching the arts of bestial sodomy.
Months had passed until I'd decided to give the man another chance because there was nothing else on TV. I came across one of his speeches. After about ten minutes I gave up and vowed never to doubt my instincts again. All hands cheered his talk of "change." And they ate up all the reassurances of "yes, we can." How "we can" and what "we can" Obama didn't answer. And who is "we" anyway? He consistently avoided specifics. The crowd didn't care, though. They were gonna get their change because they deserve it and Bush is bad and they've got it coming and Bush is bad, and that is all that mattered. It was ten minutes of sappy ether.
The final piece of evidence against the Great Changer was the acceptance of Obama by the mainstream media, Fixed News excepted. For any politician representing real change would never be given the time of day by the gatekeepers of official opinion. The whole charade would grind to a halt.
Ah, but perhaps you, reader, have fallen for the seductive lure of our Great Changer? If so, you surely know very little about the man. Let me help. I'll save you the work. He is little different from any other clown who's ever resided in the imperial capital. He only looks so good because his would be predecessor looks so bad. Since he has pledged to support the Israeli regime, he will continue the war in Iraq and perhaps wage it against Iran, that's if Bush doesn't do it before he goes to hell; he will maintain the vast web of parasitical bureaucracies; he will maintain the counterfeiting operation known as the Federal Reserve; he will Sovietize medical services; he will crack down on oil speculating which will lead to shortages because he is bedfellows with the ethanol lobby; he will gun grab. Not really my idea of an innovative statesman.
Most comical about the Obama campaign are his devotees, a colorful and zealous bunch. They mainly consist of naive antiwar voters, spiteful liberals, panting socialists, and bandwagon jobs. They are well fortified against the facts. Obama has made threats against Iran and Pakistan; he has pledged to send more troops to Afghanistan; he will maintain the "Green Zone" in Iraq. Of course, he does all these things with a noble air of diplomacy, so say his followers. Others assure us that he will return to his "dovish" ways once he is crowned. Don't hold your breath.
The secret to Barack Obama is that he allows many Americans to convince themselves that change can be gotten on the cheap, like one of those thousands of exciting emails that inform lazy dreamers like myself that they can net $250,000 on a schedule of 20hr/wk…and this is only in the first year. But the American system is so deeply screwed that anything short of a deus ex machina will not suffice. Most Americans understand that they are screwed on some level. They just don't understand the depth of the screwing, which has been ongoing for well over a century. It has only now reached the openly farcical stage, where the highest office in the land is occupied by a roundly reviled, rootin' tootin', cross-eyed half-wit.
One more thing, reader. Lest you go making hasty assumptions, although not a member of the Obama cult, I am no McCain lover. Indeed, all civilized men as well as conservatives must stand against John McCain. The man is clearly insane and hated by even his fellow Republicans. His main qualification for high office is that he got his ass kicked again…and again…and again. There is little mystery and thus little else to say about McCain. His warhawking antics would make Bush seem like a quiet Buddhist monk in comparison.
The two main choices for Sith Lord are atrocious. But I do prefer Obama to McCain, in the same way that I prefer Mark David Chapman to John Wayne Gacy. With McCain, we die by racking; with Obama, firing squad. The choice is therefore obvious. So can I get a light?
The reason why it caught my eye was because the last time some silver-tongued, underdog, Illinois politician rose up from nowhere America suffered its greatest calamity. But there was more. People were smiling and wetting themselves to his words. They were flocking from near and far to hear his sermons. "He's so different," they said. Some unwashed mass even proclaimed, "I haven't felt this excited since Jack Kennedy." It was then that I knew this Obama person was a fraud, a bamboozler. You see, friend, I trust most of my fellow citizens—well, the 1/3 of them who vote, anyway; the smarter majority long ago left the business of voting—to make the tough political decisions. I do. I trust them to make the right idiotic choices and to be the biggest suckers in the room, for they are always ripe for a savior.
I gave little thought about Mr. Obama until I heard he would be running for president. Not long after that I was coming back to Baltimore from another business trip in D.C. On the train was an attractive—liberal minded—20-something girl reading a book called The Audacity of Hope. Pictured along such highfalutin lingua was a grinning Barack Obama. Which was yet further evidence that he was a phony. Because having an American politician offer us commoners thoughts of real hope is like a pious virgin preaching the arts of bestial sodomy.
Months had passed until I'd decided to give the man another chance because there was nothing else on TV. I came across one of his speeches. After about ten minutes I gave up and vowed never to doubt my instincts again. All hands cheered his talk of "change." And they ate up all the reassurances of "yes, we can." How "we can" and what "we can" Obama didn't answer. And who is "we" anyway? He consistently avoided specifics. The crowd didn't care, though. They were gonna get their change because they deserve it and Bush is bad and they've got it coming and Bush is bad, and that is all that mattered. It was ten minutes of sappy ether.
The final piece of evidence against the Great Changer was the acceptance of Obama by the mainstream media, Fixed News excepted. For any politician representing real change would never be given the time of day by the gatekeepers of official opinion. The whole charade would grind to a halt.
Ah, but perhaps you, reader, have fallen for the seductive lure of our Great Changer? If so, you surely know very little about the man. Let me help. I'll save you the work. He is little different from any other clown who's ever resided in the imperial capital. He only looks so good because his would be predecessor looks so bad. Since he has pledged to support the Israeli regime, he will continue the war in Iraq and perhaps wage it against Iran, that's if Bush doesn't do it before he goes to hell; he will maintain the vast web of parasitical bureaucracies; he will maintain the counterfeiting operation known as the Federal Reserve; he will Sovietize medical services; he will crack down on oil speculating which will lead to shortages because he is bedfellows with the ethanol lobby; he will gun grab. Not really my idea of an innovative statesman.
Most comical about the Obama campaign are his devotees, a colorful and zealous bunch. They mainly consist of naive antiwar voters, spiteful liberals, panting socialists, and bandwagon jobs. They are well fortified against the facts. Obama has made threats against Iran and Pakistan; he has pledged to send more troops to Afghanistan; he will maintain the "Green Zone" in Iraq. Of course, he does all these things with a noble air of diplomacy, so say his followers. Others assure us that he will return to his "dovish" ways once he is crowned. Don't hold your breath.
The secret to Barack Obama is that he allows many Americans to convince themselves that change can be gotten on the cheap, like one of those thousands of exciting emails that inform lazy dreamers like myself that they can net $250,000 on a schedule of 20hr/wk…and this is only in the first year. But the American system is so deeply screwed that anything short of a deus ex machina will not suffice. Most Americans understand that they are screwed on some level. They just don't understand the depth of the screwing, which has been ongoing for well over a century. It has only now reached the openly farcical stage, where the highest office in the land is occupied by a roundly reviled, rootin' tootin', cross-eyed half-wit.
One more thing, reader. Lest you go making hasty assumptions, although not a member of the Obama cult, I am no McCain lover. Indeed, all civilized men as well as conservatives must stand against John McCain. The man is clearly insane and hated by even his fellow Republicans. His main qualification for high office is that he got his ass kicked again…and again…and again. There is little mystery and thus little else to say about McCain. His warhawking antics would make Bush seem like a quiet Buddhist monk in comparison.
The two main choices for Sith Lord are atrocious. But I do prefer Obama to McCain, in the same way that I prefer Mark David Chapman to John Wayne Gacy. With McCain, we die by racking; with Obama, firing squad. The choice is therefore obvious. So can I get a light?
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