Giant Mutant Cockroach interviews Joe the Plumber

GMC: So, Joe . . . Can I call you Joe?

JtP: Sure, why not. Can I smash you with a shoe?

GMC: I'd rather you didn't. So let's drop the pretense. You're not really Joe the plumber, are you?

JtP: And you're not really a giant cockroach.

GMC: Touché.

JtP: But in any case, it doesn't matter that I'm not the real Joe the plumber, because the Joe the plumber that John McCain and Sarah Palin have been talking about is not the real Joe the Plumber. They've been talking about me.

GMC: So who are you, exactly?

JtP: I'm the Joe the Plumber that lives in the heart of every real American. And Barack Obama wants to raise my taxes. And that's downright unamerican.

GMC: But Joe, Obama will only raise taxes on those earning more than $250,000 a year. You don't earn anywhere near that much, do you?

JtP: See, that's the really insidious part of Obama's evil plan. Sure, I'm not earning that much yet. But someday I might! That's my dream, that's the American dream, and Barack Obama wants to tax the American dream! Sure I may only be pulling in thirty grand now, and I may be living in a rented doublewide, but at night I dream of owning a mansion. A really huge mansion. But as soon as I start dreaming, along comes Obama, saying he'll raise my taxes, and because of that I'll only be able to afford a 9,000 square foot mansion, instead of the 9,500 square feet I always dreamed of! Instead of buying a Rolls Royce, I'll have to settle for a Bentley. Hell, if I gotta compromise my dreams that way, it's not even worth striving for them. In fact, I don't think I'll even go in to work tomorrow.

GMC: Damn, Joe, that is bad. I never realised that when you raise taxes on the rich by even a small amount people will stop wanting to be rich. That could have a devastating effect on the whole economy!

JtP: Sure, 'cause if you can't be dirty, stinkin', filthy rich, what's the point? You might as well just be poor.

GMC: So if that's the case, why doesn't John McCain propose cutting taxes on the rich to zero? Then the poor would have no excuses any more. They couldn't help but work hard to try to be rich!

JtP: How do you know he won't do just that? Didn't you hear him last week when he said he's got the Democrats right where he wants 'em? He's been lulling them into complacency, and next week, in the final week of the campaign, he'll spring his "zero taxes on the rich" plan on the unsuspecting public. And it'll be too late for the Democrats to react. John McCain will win in a landslide!

GMC: Christ, what a maverick!

JtP: Yeah, it almost makes me feel sorry for the Democrats. They'll never know what hit 'em.

"Here I come to save the day!"

John McCain is fast becoming the Andy Kaufman of presidential politics. When he calls a press conference to invite Obama to agree to changing the format of the debate to a wrestling match, you'll know it's all over.

America, this is the LAST thing we need in a President.

John McCain, appearing on the Rachel Ray show:

"My hero is Jack Bauer," he said.

Good practical advice.

Always make sure the cap is screwed on before you begin to aggressively shake the bottle of salad dressing.

What is the sound of one shoe dropping?

The Anonymous Liberal has more on the gang that couldn't forge straight.

Modus Operandi

Remember last year when former CIA analyst Ray McGovern accused Vice President Dick Cheney of being behind the Niger forgeries?

Now Ron Suskind claims in his new book that the White House ordered the CIA to forge a back-dated, handwritten letter from the head of Iraqi intelligence to Saddam Hussein that would state that 9/11 ringleader Mohammad Atta had actually trained for his mission in Iraq.

From the linked Politico article: “It is not the sort of offense, such as assault or burglary, that carries specific penalties, for example, a fine or jail time,” Suskind writes. “It is much broader than that. It pertains to the White House’s knowingly misusing an arm of government, the sort of thing generally taken up in impeachment proceedings.”

I seriously doubt that this will lead to impeachment proceedings, and that doesn't really bother me. Sure, I'd like to see it happen, but I'm sympathetic to the argument that at this point in the election cycle impeachment proceedings might be counterproductive to the aim of making sure Barack Obama wins the election in November. What does bother me somewhat is the possibility that Congress won't even make a serious effort to investigate the truth of Suskind's claims, and that even if they attempt to do so the White House will successfully stonewall the investigation, as they have countless times before. But what bothers me the most is the likelihood that the vast majority of the American public won't get even slightly angry about this, that we won't see the sort of public outrage about this that would make Congress seriously consider impeachment. Instead, the public will be distracted by the thought that in some way Barack Obama is somehow the political equivalent of Paris Hilton. I hope I'm wrong about this, but I fear I'm not.

Grrrrrrrr.

(Slightly) Shorter Joe Lieberman:

Just lie back and think of England America.

My Profanity-laced Rant Against the Media

It seems we have a global food crisis on our hands. Who knew? Well I sure as hell wouldn't, if the major news outlets were all I paid attention to. Why do I have to go to National fucking Geographic to find out about this? What network news editor decided that telling the American people about a global food crisis was a less important story than manufactured outrage about something Wes Clark said? Why aren't all the networks starting their broadcasts by screaming "Ohmifuckingod! We're out of food!!! HALP!"? Sure, I catch these little snippets here and there, such as stories about Japan's butter shortage or about Costco rationing basmati rice in California. But where is the big picture view? Why do these stories have to be doled out like little clues leading up to the two-part season finale in which it is revealed that the food crisis is the result of the Daleks stealing the Earth's food to feed their new army of genetically-engineered pig slaves?

I see this as yet another sign of the decline of our media. It's lamentable but relatively unimportant that there are now kids entering college who do not remember a time when you could turn on MTV and see music videos. (Yeah, yeah, get off my lawn, yadda yadda . . .) But is it too much to ask that I be able to turn on CNN Headline News and be able to watch, you know, a summary of news headlines? Isn't that the whole point of the network? When I was a kid and we only had the three major networks plus PBS, you could watch the evening news at 6:30pm or not at all. If you wanted to watch the news while eating dinner at 7:00pm, well you were just shit-outta-luck; it was Three's Company reruns for you. But then came Headline News! You could get a half-hour full of national news anytime you wanted, even at 1:30am at the 24-hour laundromat on Nth Street. I thought 24-7 access to TV news was a problem we had solved a long time ago. If it ain't broke, don't fuck with it.

So why is it that now when I want to the news while eating dinner at 7:00pm, I turn on the so-called Headline News channel only to be greeted by a stream of idiotic bile spewing from the mouth of Glenn fucking Beck? You expect me to keep food down with that shit on? Fuck, even the Three's Company reruns were better than that. And it's not like I can just wait until his wretched show is over and then get me some news headlines, 'cause after him they have Nancy Grace, and after her they replay Glenn Beck again, and then her again, and then fucking Showbiz Tonight, and then Glenn Beck a third time, and so on. CNN Headline News has no headline news between 7pm and 3am!! WTF??? Do I have to have a TiVo now just to watch the fucking news? Hell, if some network exec has decided that Glenn Beck absolutely has to have three hours a day of TV time to share his ex recto views with the rest of us, couldn't they have put him on one of the other 200+ cable/satellite channels? Put him on QVC, and let him peddle his brand of self-satisfied pseudo-conservatism in between pitches for cubic zirconia necklaces and Ginsu knives.

Where have you gone, Lynne Russell? A news-hungry nation turns its eyes to you.

"But they all look alike to me."

Via Talking Points Memo, we learn of Karl Rove's recent characterization of Barack Obama:

He's the guy at the country club with the beautiful date, holding a martini and a cigarette that stands against the wall and makes snide comments about everyone who passes by.

Sorry, Karl, you've got Obama confused with a different black guy:

You look like that guy. In that movie.

I was in a store yesterday, and one of the employees said to me, "You look just like [name of actor] in [name of movie], only his hair was darker."

The funny thing is, said actor did not appear in said movie.

Despite this, I am absolutely certain I know exactly what he meant.