Sarah Palin is just basically a horrible person.

LOOK AT IT.

LOOK AT IT.

Biggest jackasss I've ever heard on NPR on the Diane Rehms show right now: Stuart Taylor.

Better yet, he's written a book entitled "Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case" -- and I don't even know what to do with that. The title of that book doesn't even fit in my mouth. He's got a huge hard-on for the Bush administration and his one piece of evidence that torture and illegal wiretapping and illegal everything the administration did is that there wasn't another 9/11. That's it.
To be fair in the slightest sense, there's another guy saying "LET'S TRY THE ENTIRE BUSH ADMINISTRATION FOR WAR CRIMES RIGHT NOW" as if the Obama administration was elected to do that, rather than fix the shitstorm which has developed over the last eight years.
And there's one dude who's like "can we talk about something else"


THANKS DIANE. Like I needed to wake up to this bullshit. I wanted to be in a good mood this morning. It's like listening to Hardball or some shit. On NPR.

WITH DIANE REHM.

wtf israel and gaza

this is fucking retarded already.

i'm about done with seeing dead babies on reddit because of this shit. i know the diplomacy route has fucking sucked for generations, but fuck -- like bombs are really going to make this situation any better.

i have israeli and palestinian friends and wtf, they are both totally rad. they are all totally intelligent and fucking responsible and NONE of them want wars and death and horrible shit like this. no one, anywhere, deserves to go through this bullshit.

2009. can we get some peace up in here?

Things I Am Thankful For : 2008 Edition
(not entirely inclusive, obviously)

- Mark Oniffrey
- and subsequently my family, of course
- President-Elect Barack Obama and the election
- Emily Clark-Kramer
- My cervical treatment, and that it was caught early
- My (eventually) successful wisdom tooth removal
- Aylim Castro, Dr. Glen Martin, Lizzette Potthoff, Kathleen Transue, Dr. Lisa Emrich, Dr. Jon Williams, and Dr. Jim Kurz
- Getting off antidepressants
- Reconciling with Ed
- Being able to be with Pete when he died
- Meeting (and now knowing) Mark's friends
- The beginning of the year, to figure out where I was going
- Rikki's health
- Turning 21
- Ann Coulter's jaw being wired shut
- Sarah Palin. Seriously.

finally,

- hope.

http://www.popcrunch.com/this-guy-loves-apostrophes-almost-as-much-as-he-loves-jesus/

Mark (in jest): "Yeah, I'm definitely all of that first column"
(I question a few of them, which he starts eliminating)
"You're a wifebeater?"
"No."
"Who's your wife? I need to know about this."
"You don't have to worry about it, I already beat her to death."
"..."


Also, I passed out for no reason a little while ago and hit my head on the kitchen floor and it hurts. I think I need to eat, or drink, or go to the doctor or something.
Yeah, need to call my doctor tomorrow.

Okay, is this woman out of her mind?

ACORN? That shit is said and proven ridiculously retarded. Marxist? What??? The Great Depression started because of stratification between classes in the 20s, and it's like no one knows this. "Spreading the wealth around," the whole "Joe the Plumber" bullshit, is not Marxist, jesus christ. By the way, Joe the Plumber would get ridiculously awesome tax breaks running a small business. So, yes, his personal income tax will go up if he moves up into a higher tax bracket by owning the company and having a higher salary. But the federal taxes on his own business will be pretty awesomely reduced. His tax position really isn't shitty at all. Unless he fucks the business up. And that's up to him. Capitalism is still alive and well, buddy. Barack Obama may be promoting higher taxes for the upper class and tax breaks for the middle, but that hardly makes him a socialist. Much less a Marxist.

Regardless, for John McCain, it's sort of a bad sign when your running mate is "going rogue" in order to distance herself from you a week before the election in order to protect her own ass from your potential failure. That's just silly.

Anyway, Barbara West's husband is some Republican robot machine, and her interview with John McCain was all soft and cuddly. People are idiots.

It is my general understanding that a debate is sort of like, I guess, a situation in which two sides kind of like... I guess, present their platforms and explain why their respective platforms are better. And, I think, most of these sort of platforms are made up of, I dunno, like, ideas.

This is totally not fair to John McCain; someone on his staff obviously left his ideas at home.

"I GOT THESE PLANS, I TOTALLY GOT 'EM, THEY'RE AWESOME, BUT THEY'RE AT HOME"

omfg Barack Obama just said "orgy" my life is complete.

MAN, our economy ROCKS! thank god our president and Republican presidential candidate are there to remind us! Oh, and remember that guy, Alan Greenspan?

Reuters:

Greenspan also said the chances of escaping a recession was "less than 50 percent."

"I can't believe we could have a once-in-a-century type of financial crisis without a significant impact on the real economy globally, and I think that indeed is what is in the process of occurring.

It's so awesome it's so unclear as to how the Fed plans to keep on keepin' on. There's a responsible way to let the market "correct itself," and an irresponsible way. Bailing out Bear Stearns, for instance: irresponsible. Letting the asshat CEOs at the head of the other national banks and lending companies see where their absurd bonuses and risks lead the company (hint: into the ground); well, that's capitalism. Though one can hardly blame the risk-takers -- the incentive sure as hell was there. It's just that there's some collateral damage. Like, jobs.

Sure, I'm pretty much a socialist, but if we're going to do the whole capitalism thing, it's kind of stupid for the government to reverse the market economy so as to "reward poor leadership" (thx Obamatron). I believe (and correct me if I'm wrong) I'm somewhat on par with my libertarian friends here. Local and regional banks, on the whole, are not weak institutions -- and they're not as tied up in the national banks as one might think. They're not in a bad position to step up as the national institutions fall.

But the foundation's there; we've been going downhill since BEFORE Sept. 11th 2001. I imagine the downward trend of the economy sort of like a falling pinball, simple physics: the longer that ball runs towards the bottom without obstacles, the more momentum it gains, and the the harder it is to follow it to defend against it. And then, over the past seven years, the ball has hit targets that just increase its momentum -- more industries take hits and more CEO asshattery is sanctioned by the government. Greenspan seems right on, in my opinion (although I'm certainly no economist). We're headed towards an epic reset which will might require something like 21st century FDRNewDeal-tokens. We can all hope for a ramp right before Game Over -- but that is a rapidly shrinking possibility, and it's idiocracy to lean on it like the second coming.

Anyway, that's what we call an overextended metaphor.

(funny coincidence, though)


But just as a final note, somewhat unrelated: when Karl Rove says your attack ads are going "too far" and are not "100% truthful" -- hell hath frozen over.

Oh, also, Dell? Yeah. Telling me that I have the same problem I told you I had two weeks ago, and then telling me you don't know how to fix it, and giving me a pity 12-mo extension of my warranty? Not going to fly. Not as long as my gfx dies every time I try to open Firefox, and then I just have an expensive strobe light. Seriously? If I were epileptic, you'd be so fucked.

Someone hates New Orleans.
But apparently, because of Gustav, someone either loves or hates the Repooplicans; I can't tell yet. I'm thinking, maybe, the Republicans will actually benefit from death and destruction. But, you know, that's not new.

COMMENTARY ON CNN ARTICLE: ( COMMENCE! )


Finally, I'm going to mention here that Sarah Palin hates polar bears. And I'm not even joking about that. To Sarah Palin, oil > the existence of polar bears. No joke. Look it up.

NOW LOOK AT A BABY POLAR BEAR:

LOOK AT IT

Paul Begala's editorial on Sarah Palin (emphases mine):

(CNN) -- John McCain needs what Kinky Friedman calls "a checkup from the neck up."

In choosing Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to be his running mate, he is not thinking "outside the box," as some have said. More like out of his mind.

Palin, a first-term governor of a state with more reindeer than people, will have to put on a few pounds just to be a lightweight. Her personal story is impressive: former fisherman, mother of five. But that hardly qualifies her to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.

For a man who is 72 years old and has had four bouts with cancer to have chosen someone so completely unqualified to become president is shockingly irresponsible. Suddenly, McCain's age and health become central issues in the campaign, as does his judgment.

In choosing this featherweight, McCain passed over Tom Ridge, a decorated combat hero, a Cabinet secretary and the former two-term governor of the large, complex state of Pennsylvania.

He passed over Mitt Romney, who ran a big state, Massachusetts; a big company, Bain Capital; and a big event, the Olympics.

He passed over Kay Bailey Hutchison, the Texas senator who is knowledgeable about the military, good on television and -- obviously -- a woman.

He passed over Joe Lieberman, his best friend in the Senate and fellow Iraq Kool-Aid drinker.

He passed over former congressman, trade negotiator and budget director Rob Portman.

And he also passed over Mike Huckabee, the governor of Arkansas.

For months, the McCainiacs have said they will run on his judgment and experience. In his first presidential decision, John McCain has shown that he is willing to endanger his country, potentially leaving it in the hands of someone who simply has no business being a heartbeat away from the most powerful, complicated, difficult job in human history.

I LIED! While something/one fucked with my Facebook account (general Facebook security?), it's MY HEATSINK! I think. Maybe.
I wrote a really long e-mail to Dell about it, because actually explaining technical problems to technical support in technical terms IN REAL TIME is just -- oh my god it's horrible. So I basically wrote what might as well have been a manifesto based on my complete lack of faith in ear-to-ear or IM-to-IM conversation with an actual person with issues as important as my fucked up gfx.

ANYWAY. This is absolutely essential, and if for some absurd reason you don't want to listen to 4 minutes and 42 seconds of pure gold, here are my favorite parts:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=183521&title=john-mccain-chooses-a-running

0:46 - 1:06 -- Why Sarah Palin?
1:39 - 2:27 -- I want to ruin the punchline so bad but basically this is one of my favorite Daily Show moments EVER.
2:27 - 2:52 -- What is are to be VP?
Samantha Bee has the last part of the segment -- and if you have a vagina and love your vagina, I suggest you watch this.

Um, OKAY. Remember the Michael Peterson case, that writer in Raleigh who killed his wife like, seven years ago?

"Larry Pollard says he believes an owl, possibly mistaking Kathleen Peterson as prey, could have attacked the 120-pound, 47-year-old as she walked from her swimming pool to her kitchen on that warm December night in 2001."

Apparently, someone found a feather.

“Now, at first when you hear that, it sounds ridiculous, except when you look at the wounds, when you look at the fact that these birds are in our neighborhood and that they have been there for years and years and years," he said. "That they have this kind of characteristics of their talons that they do this kind of damage."

Source: WRAL

okay CHRIST ON A FUCKING CRACKER.

mark has had a sore throat for three days. incl. what is still my today but is now technically 24 hours ago. so, yesterday, he was a hell of a lot worse, and there was a *hole* in the fucking back of his throat. I have no idea how else to describe it. he went to class and got out at like 8:30 last night, and basically sounded like he had Down's. this is what they call "hot potato mouth," apparently. because it makes you sound like you have a mouth full of hot potatoes. no joke, that is a professional medical term. (it's kind of hilarious to hear, though)

now, i had already convinced him to make an appointment with his regular doctor, which was an incredible feat in itself. people who work in medicine do not take care of themselves. it's 100% ridiculous and 100% true. but when he came home and eventually stopped swallowing his own saliva, i was all, "okay, we're going to the ER now." "ahhh... fine. just after this episode of star trek is over." (which is what he said, but not what it sounded like)

we got to UNC at about 11:30, at which point he couldn't speak coherently and i was pretty much freaking out (which was under control fairly quickly -- thanks, anti-anxiety meds!). got him in, they started fluid and antibiotic IVs, then got a CT scan. took him back to his room, and once he was halfway through his bag of antibiotics/steroids he was pretty much asleep. i was pretty much not for eight hours.

so, here's my main problem. they told me it would take an hour to get the CT results back, but they already pretty much knew 100% that it was a peritonsillar abscess (aka tonsillitis on crack), which generally requires some minor surgery (cutting and draining and aspirating and things that make me feel a little nauseous). so he got the scan at like 2, and 3:00 rolled around, 4, 5, and finally I was like "okay, where the hell are his CT results?" so, the nurse tells me that they've been in for two hours, but the ENT specialist who we saw when we first got there is apparently a complete flake and doesn't respond to pages; he just comes in at 6 AM instead, when it's, you know, more convenient. for him.

so jackass finally comes in and evaluates him and decides that, even though the infection had gotten to other tissues in his throat around his tonsils, he was just going to give mark every antibiotic/steroid ever, and then have mark see a different ENT specialist on friday, whether mark felt okay or not. then it was all, "okay, bye!"

we got out of there like an hour ago and i am so fucking pissed off.

and, admittedly, some of this is because mark got to sleep most of the night while i was trying to curl up on two chairs i'd pushed together beside his bed. and it could not have possibly been a degree more than 65 in that room. i got four blankets -- two for mark and two for me. but he had the whole bed thing and i cannot tolerate cold, so i was just wired all night on a combination of discomfort, 100% unadulterated and distilled concern that mark was going to die (this happens), adrenaline, and a significant drop in core body temperature.

if i ever have to be on that flip-side experience of the ER again, i'm going to have to find some way to at least get a bed.