Exclamation point

When Ryan Clark is arraigned later in the week for one count of knocking the everliving fuck out of Wes Welker, I want you to remember why. It gets funnier every time you watch it. 33-10, hope yinz are able to make the playoffs after that. Hope everyone didn't break too many ankles jumping off the Cassel bandwagon. Looks a lot different when he plays a real defense, huh?

Also, James Harrison is your 2008 DPOY. He is king of the jungle. He is 12 angry men. He ate the Hulk. He is Kong. Build a statue of this man getting held and still making the play.

THE_REAL_SHAQ

Words of wisdom on this fine Saturday from Shaq's Twitter feed.

• How come i have the mr rogers neighborhhood theme song stuk n my head, iz he still alive
  
• Why is today called black friday
  
• Destroyed by the heat jeeeez
  
• Im still full from thanksgivn jeeeeez
  
• Why do they call minneapolis, the twin cities, nobody here looks a like, waaa waaa waaaaaa
  
• Does anyone have the names of the 14 people bush gave pardons
  
• Does anyone believe this jordan van der sloot guy
• Detective oneal does not jordan vander sloots story about what happened to natalee
• Mark crow, larry jones, and i recieved 36 thousand jars of peanut butta tonite at victory church in oklahoma city
• Im wearing a jacket dat says 1946, a lady asked me wat it means, i replied, mam its the yr i was born. Lol
• On my way to oklahoma city, gettin ready to send 2 million lbs of peanut butta to africa
  
• Watchn true blood, thats were i was born and raised, dat vampire town, shaqula has been discovered aaaaggggh
  
• Last nite i told greg oden , "we r not the same, i am a martian"
• DATS TWITTER SLANG
  
• THOSE R NOT TYPOS, JUST SAVN MONEY, MORE U TYPE MORE U PAY, LOL
  

You stay classy, shoppers!

Wal-Mart Shoppers Trample Man to Death

Police say a Wal-Mart worker has died after being trampled by a throng of unruly shoppers shortly after the Long Island store opened Friday.

Nassau County police say the 34-year-old worker was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead at about 6 a.m., an hour after the store opened. The cause of death was not immediately known.

A police statement says a throng of shoppers "physically broke down the doors, knocking him to the ground." Police also say a 28-year-old pregnant woman was taken to a hospital for observation.

Our first sale related death of the season. Who says the economy has dampened our shopping instincts? We still know to stomp a man to death so we can be the first over to the table of discounted, irregular sweater vests. Props for fucking up the pregnant woman too. No malady, pregnancy, or infirmity will garner sympathy in the discount pits.

Wal-Mart, where even human life is cheap!

Good morning. Go buy a bunch of shit.

On loan from Banksy

Thanksgiving

"Thanksgiving: when everyone in Britain gives thanks
for our ancestors having sent all the religious freaks
to America.

You're welcome."

-- Warren Ellis

Compare/Contrast

President Bush Pardons Iowa Turkey Today

Obama names Volcker to head new economic advisers

One fucks around with turkeys, the other creates an Economic Recovery Advisory Board and staffs it with the best and brightest non-turkey or bird related humans. Furthermore, that turkey Bush pardoned was indicted for war crimes, racketeering, killing three bald eagles, and for bribing public officials.

Which one is the President now? If it isn't Obama can we make it the pardoned turkey?

China two-fer

U.S. finds trace of melamine in baby formula

U.S. health officials have found trace amounts of the chemical melamine in one sample of infant formula sold in the United States, a Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman said on Tuesday.

"There's no basis for concern because we're talking about trace levels that are so low ... that there's absolutely no risk," FDA spokeswoman Judy Leon said.

Yippee, skippee. You feed it to your baby then, Judy. Finally, China's cut rate oversight policies and cripplingly inefficient regulatory structure has let tainted baby milk onto our shores. This really puts the favor in "Most Favored Nation" trading status. The Bush Administration, true to form to its last dying incompetent breath, says the contamination isn't a problem and everything's OK because even if it is contaminated, it's not contaminated enough to cause problems. Well, thanks then. Maybe I'm a stickler, but can't we shoot for no contaminated milk?

China calls off EU summit over Dalai Lama row

China has called off a summit with the European Union scheduled for next Monday because of plans for Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, to visit European leaders and institutions, the EU said.

In Paris, a French government spokesman confirmed French President Nicolas Sarkozy, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, would go ahead and meet the Dalai Lama in Poland next month despite Beijing's displeasure.

Classic China, get all pissy because people have the gall to meet with the revered spiritual leader (who you tried to kill) of a country to invaded, oppressed, and have tried to beat down and homogenize for decades. Now hold your breath and stamp your feet. Sarkozy counters with a Classic French stance of "Fuck you, we'll do what we want, we're France, you're not." China's also mad because the European Parliament had the gall to award political prisoner Hu Jia with a human rights prize, failing to recognize that China had in fact revoked Jia's human rights. Egg meet face, Euro Parliament. I guess the world is going to have to learn not to point out to China all the stuff China does. Recognizing human rights abuses is so impolite.

Your New National Security Team

Defense Secretary: Robert Gates aka the same guy who is already there. Good news, those "Gates: Defense Secretary 4 Life" t-shirts you had made up? They're still valid. On the plus side he's been much, much better than Rumsfeld. On the minus side, the only two lower bars than that are 'better President than George W Bush' and 'less of a craven baby eater than Dick Cheney'. He also might be Bush's one competent selection, but BFD. The rationale is that Obama is going to be so busy personally pulling levers and turning gears to get the economy working he'll need continuity at Defense, so he doesn't have to worry about it. As if they're going to hide all the important papers from the new guy at Defense and Obama will have to come over and help look for them. Concentrating on foreign and domestic policy, isn't this the walking and chewing gum thing we all derided McCain for when he said he couldn't handle a debate and pretending to do something about the financial crisis?

The other school of thought is that when Obama pulls us out of Iraq, disbands the military, and hands over all our soldiers to an Islamic theocracy for trial, that he'll ostensibly need the cover of a Republican Defense Secretary. Yes, because no one will bitch if Gates is around. The final reasoning is "bipartisan blah blah blah" to which I'm making a furious "wank off" hand gesture. Whatever, Gates was open to withdrawal and hasn't been bad, so I give Barack my all important not thrilled, but not angry, 'meh' of approval.

National Security Adviser: General Jim Jones. You thought he died with his followers at that mass suicide in Guyana, didn't you? Nope, he escaped, joined the Marines and rehabilitated himself, rising to NATO supreme commander, then started UK garage/psychedelic/hard rock band Thee Hypnotics. He's back and he's ready to advise. Let's hope his early tenure is better than Condi's, where she spent the months ignoring Richard Clarke, ignoring terrorism, and concentrated on missile defense. I forget what happened after that.

Changey enough? Not changey enough? This are the men making the national security decisions for you when you join the military to escape debtors prison.

Broken News: Inmates agree, Cheney “one hard ass screw”

HOUSTON—After last week’s indictments of both Vice President Dick Cheney and former Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez for their involvements in the ownership of private prison companies running federal detention centers, today brought an even more stunning revelation regarding Mr. Cheney’s association. As it turns out, not only was Mr. Cheney involved in the ownership of the prison organizations, but the Vice President had taken an active interest in the day-to-day operations of these penitentiaries, often taking on the duties of a prison guard.

“Boss Cheney? Fuck me, he was a hard-ass screw,” recalled former Briscoe County Prison inmate John McGraw, now doing a ten-year felony bit in Dallas for promoting the use and ownership of more than six dildos. “He used to patrol the yard wearing nothing but his hat, belt, and baton. He was just daring anyone to take a crack at him, so he could make an example of you. He’d toss cells, deride your shank-making ability, smack you around a bit, drink your toilet wine. He wanted everyone to know who ran that prison.”

An examination of public records revealed Cheney working as a either a full or part-time guard over the past three decades in over 13 separate prisons in 7 different states. Oddly, there are no official pay records, suggesting Cheney did this work for free. While no official performance reviews of Mr. Cheney are available, those willing to come forward describe the almost preternatural calling the Vice President had for the job.

“Preternatural? I don’t know if I’d use that term. Maniacally sadistic, maybe” observed Ben Palmer, currently out on parole in Abilene after his conviction for shooting a buffalo out of a second story window. “You know those crazed, corrupt prison guards that are in every prison movie? I’ve heard half of them were based on him. Shawshank’s Byron Hadley? I'm pretty sure Stephen King had to tone down Cheney’s behavior to not make it seem so cartoonishly violent. Christ, I heard one time he dropped a safe on a guy.”

While King did not wish to be interviewed for this piece, sources close to the author revealed Mr. Palmer’s story to be largely true. The character of Hadley was chiefly based on King’s experiences with the Vice President while the author was serving time in Bangor Penitentiary for illegally pushing a live moose out of a plane in 1983. Others claim the Hadley character was a composite of both King’s tenure under Cheney’s brutal command and historical accounts of famed Nazi war criminal, Adolf Eichmann.

“Some people, they just don’t appreciate this man’s contributions enough,” suggested prison historian David Griggs. “You want to focus on the violence, rights violations, and the absurdity of a sitting Vice President being intimately involved in private prison management, fine. I just don’t think we’re focusing enough on his legacy of the prison guard clichés and tropes Mr. Cheney wove into the fabric of Americana. King and Shawshank were just the tip of the iceberg.”

Griggs began listing them. “You know where the hero is about to get his ass beat by a group of crooks and the guard either turns away or vacates the area? Cheney invented that! Walking new inmates out in front of the rest of the prison? Cheney even coined the term 'fresh fish.' Destroying the last hope of a man on the edge by killing his beloved pet or stopping him from doing the painting or woodworking that keeps him sane? Keeping caged animals on his desk as a metaphor? Creating scenarios where crawling through miles of human fecal matter is preferable to spending one more second in that godforsaken cage? He invented them all. Show some proper respect!”

Sources say Cheney eventually tired of working over inmates, dirty dealings with wardens, and dangling smart, wife-killin’ bankers off the roofs of the main building, and decided to move into prison management so as to better transition into profiting on all aspects of American misery. These sources call Cheney's prison guard experience a "phase," a three-decade phase that indelibly marked the prisons of our country with extraordinary guard-related violence.

Legal scholars are unclear what effect these new revelations will have on the pending indictment and have dubbed the revelations “wholly unsurprising” and deemed it “impossible, statistically speaking, for anything to give the American public a lower opinion about the Vice President.” The case against Mr. Cheney and Gonzalez is expected to be thrown out as the result of a predictable unconditional pardon early next year.

randomusement

I don't think that the field of mathematics has conjured a term capable of delineating the number of times I have heard the following phrase while walking around New York City:

"And then he friended me on Facebook and I was like, 'what?'"

You all make me tired.

UPDATE: Nevermind. Found it.

Baby, I didn't mean it!

Joe Lieberman continues to not do himself any favors, even as he backpedals from all of the positions taken whilst fucking the Democrats. The latest incarnation involves denying he ever claimed Obama was not ready to be president. Keith Olbermann takes the slam dunk.



Joe, just because the Democrats had nothing to gain politically by publicly calling you a traitor and a rank, jabbering jackass before completely ostracizing you from government doesn't mean you can get away with this nonsense. You've been let off the hook for your atrocious behavior and even got to keep your chairmanship. Count your blessings and shut the fuck up until 2012 when New Hampshire kicks your turncoat ass to the curb.

/via myleftnutmeg

Let me rain on our Obama parade

The grownups are coming

Seriously, isn’t it amazing just how impressive the people being named to key positions in the Obama administration seem? Bye-bye hacks and cronies, hello people who actually know what they’re doing. For a bunch of people who were written off as a permanent minority four years ago, the Democrats look remarkably like the natural governing party these days, with a deep bench of talent.

If I may be permitted to spit into the wind here, isn't that what everyone said about Bush's people too? He had Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Armitage, O'Neill, Powell, Rice, the Fonz, and all our favorite cartoon friends. It's hard to remember now, but those people used to have sterling reputations, and while clearly right wing, at least heralded some level of competence and respect.

Didn't really work out that way, did it? Now while a lot of Obama's picks and prospective picks look good, if they all decide they're King Shit of Fuck Mountain, decide to engage in every far out whim and notion they ever held about governance, Biden goes off to form his own shadow government, they all start backstabbing and undermining each other from the drop, and Obama sits idly by unable to stop it, then it doesn't really mean anything. Execution is the thing.

Picture of the day

Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman meets simpering failure President George Bush

"Thanks George, if it weren't for the utter fallacy and failure of your economic policies tilting the nation into some bottomless abyss giving me a larger platform with which to criticize and pontificate on economics, I probably wouldn't have won a Nobel this year."

"Uhh, you're welcome? Who are you?"

Good news: Economy worse than expected

Economy's tumble even worse than expected in 3Q

The economy took a tumble in the summer that was worse than first thought as American consumers throttled back their spending by the most in 28 years, further proof the country is almost certainly in the throes of a painful recession.

The updated reading on the economy's performance, released Tuesday by the Commerce Department, showed gross domestic product shrank at a 0.5 percent annual rate in the July-September quarter.
...
The new reading on GDP underscores just how quickly the economy deteriorated as housing, credit and financial crises intensified. The economy logged growth of 2.8 percent in the second quarter.

This is always the good news you want to hear. "You know that economic collapse thing, with the stock market collapse, the global credit crisis, the home foreclosures, the job loss, and all that? You know how everyone says it's the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression? Yeah...uhhhh...it's worse than that." The good news? If you can afford to buy things, you are one of the lucky few. That means you'll be able to reap the Christmas season benefits of massively discounted shit that stores are going to be tossing out there so as to stave off total collapse. The economy is in the shitter, but you might leverage it into a nice 1080p HD LCD.

Don't worry though, Hank Paulson has a plan. Another $600 billion from the Fed to buy up distressed mortgages with no relief to actual home owners. They'll talk about making loans easier to get(wasn't that the point of the last massive bailout, to unfreeze credit markets?), but won't talk about job creation so you can actually pay off the loan. Lie naked on a pile of money, then call up his Wall Street buddies and start giving handing out all the money that was touching his nude ass. Two months until the adults can actually do something.

Your revisionist Bush history

Iraq Ally Lists Were Altered, Study Shows

Before invading Iraq in 2003, the Bush administration mounted a significant diplomatic offensive to rally international support, and officials at the White House, Pentagon and State Department went to great lengths to trumpet those nations that joined what they termed “the coalition of the willing.”

But historians researching those early alliance-building efforts say they are troubled by what seem to be deletions of and alterations to the early official lists of nations that supported the war effort. The lists were posted on the White House Web site.

I know you said history will be the judge of you, but people are going to be getting that history somewhere other than the Bush White House homepage. I don't know George, I think you're going to have to go big with this one, real big. Fudging the dates on whether Tonga, Costa Rica, and Angola did or didn't add their moral support to the Iraq war and the Coalition of the Willing at the beginning isn't going to help you long term.I don't think anyone's going "Well now that I think there were 49 nations in the Coalition and not 45, I know deem this war a worthwhile endeavor that succeeded beyond our wildest dreams."

I think you're gonna need to go for the gusto. Fabricate the war, not just the evidence that gets us into one. Hire Tom Clancy or some other war fetishist, have them crank out a better version of Iraq, with elite secret seal teams (Red Dwarf 9 and the Arcturus Battalion), wild future tech, no sectarian conflict, and minus some of the more egregious civil liberty violations and war criminal behavior. For anyone who doesn't read the litany of other historical accounts of the war, they'll find Tom Clancy's IraqWar a chilling, thrilling roller coaster ride. Maybe bump that approval into the low thirties again.

Apparently, our fears were unfounded

According to joystiq.com, Gordon Freeman (pictured below) has everything well in-hand:

Apologies to all of you for our many, many fierce overreactions. In our defense, we've never once claimed to be anything but a source of misinformation and hateful invective.

h/t John Constantine at 61FPS

In further news, fuck the Republicans

This is almost too good. Apparently one of the front-runners to fill Hillary Clinton's potentially vacant Senate seat is Christine Quinn, New York City Council Speaker and the second most powerful city politician behind the mayor:

The top contender for Clinton's seat is New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, O'Halloran said. Other names in the mix, O'Halloran said, include New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a moderate Republican, as well as Christine Quinn, the first female and openly gay speaker of the New York City Council.

Now, I'm in no way attempting to marginalize Quinn's record on the City Council, which has been stellar since her election in January 2006. So pardon me the schadenfreude as I ponder a blind, black, Democratic Governor of one of the bluest states in the nation replacing "Secretary of State Hillary-fucking-Clinton" with a brilliant, young, gay, liberal female who cut her teeth hammering out legislation mandating equal health care benefits for both married couples and same-sex partnerships.

Seriously, what else can we add to this equation that will further infuriate the right? Can Quinn take her senate oath on a stack of Nation back issues, wrapped in the Drapeau tricolore and standing atop the rubble of a freshly bombed Liberty University? Maybe something involving "Happy Kwanzaa" banners with a special appearance by Paul Krugman and Kanye West? Can Barney Frank be somehow involved?

By the way, that sound you hear is Jerry Falwell turning in his sulfur cave.

It's all your fault, int4rwebz

Fallout from Abraham Biggs' suicide-on-webcam last week has officially jumped the shark. Not only are the authorities looking into prosecuting the justin.tv for hosting 12 hours of footage depicting young Biggs eating benzodiazepine capsules like tic tacs, the father is now getting in on the action:

Biggs' father told The Associated Press that he believes his son's post was a cry for help and that he is appalled that no one responded before it was too late.

That's right. Your obviously depressed college-aged son, having been prescribed a pharmacy-sized cocktail of antidepressants, commits public suicide and your first course of action is to assail everyone who popped in to egg him on, beg him to stop, or just watch the show. All class, man. All class.

Any chance we can persuade the state to take any remaining Briggs children off of this fucking ingrate's hands?

Broken In Brief: Economic downturn threatening hobo way of life

With national attention focused almost exclusively on the solvency of the banking, housing and automotive industries, little notice has been paid to America's hobo class, which is enduring several hardships of its own. While the long-term effects of the recession have yet to be fully realized on America's upper and middle class, the country's hobos are already reeling from a combination of reduced Amtrak lines, rag scarcity, and a marked decrease in both the quantity and quality of worn shoe leather.

"This really is a dramatic and unexpected turn," explained George Cherrington, chair of the Itinerant Downtroddenness department at Columbia University. "Nobody expected that we would see, simultaneously, the debunking of Reagenomics as a salient economic policy while witnessing such a downgrade in the quality of life amongst those at the literal shit-heeled bottom of the economic ladder. What's truly troubling is the impending inflation of the overall hobo population, which will only exacerbate the material problems we're already seeing."

Many hobos, having forsaken more traditional employment options such as manual labor, thievery, and performing crude sexual acts on day traders behind car washes, have been pushed down to a new and frighteningly brutal level of poverty, one that often involves ingesting dirt and recycling urine for purposes of bathing.

"I was honey dipping for a gump in Bangor last week and staying in this knowledge bus with these two rum dums who'd been padding the hoof since July. They were stemming just to get by, the pair of angellinas. I should have spotted them for the crumb-covered bindlestiffs they were but, you always want to give another 'bo a chance. Ah, well. Here's hoping those jungle buzzards greased the tracks or caught the westbound."

At press time, reporters were still attempting to determine what in the fuck Joe Barnacle was saying.

The Beatles break up

Hannity and Colmes split up

Fox News announced that after 12 years, Alan Colmes will be leaving the top-rated "Hannity & Colmes" at the end of the year.

“I approached Bill Shine (FNC’s Senior Vice President of Programming) earlier this year about wanting to move on after 12 years to develop new and challenging ways to contribute to the growth of the network," Colmes said in a statement. "Although it’s bittersweet to leave one of the longest marriages on cable news, I’m proud that both Sean (Hannity) and I remained unharmed after sitting side by side, night after night for so many years.”

Hold those tears dear fans, Colmes isn't dead, he's just moving to a nice farm in the country...where he'll...*sob*...have more space to roam. He's in a better place now...the radio...and he's totally going to get another show, honest. As for Hannity, how will he go on without the Statler to his Waldorf, the Oates to his Hall, the Salacious Crumb to his Jabba the Hutt? What liberal will they force upon Hannity so they can go "We aren't a network of Republican shills, look at ________ on Hannity's show. See!" How about none? It'll just be the Hannity Power Hour from now on, where he's free to traipse around the fevered swamps of the right wing fringes, like how BHO time traveled and killed Vince Foster. It'll basically be the same show, except that there won't be a creepy guy trying to get a word in as Hannity turns beet red and puffs up like a blowfish over something Bill Clinton did.

Fare thee well sweet prince, enjoy the farm, you'll have plenty of space to run.

Citibailout

While you were busy hoarding beans and pointed sticks for the harsh winter, our lame duck administration was fixing you up a nice big shit sandwich to eat. Chew it and swallow: we're bailing out Citigroup, one of those "too big to fail" corporations that is failing, probably because of minority homeowners, some law Jimmy Carter passed in '77, UAW workers, or health care. Our entire economy is made up of "too big to fail" failures. The basics of the deal are that we're making a bunch of huge asset guarantees (around $250 billion+) plus giving $27 billion freedom dollars to a company worth only $20.5 billion and we're getting some stock and laughed at behind our back. Paul Krugman, Nobel Prize winning shrill economist, described the Citiplan thusly:

A bailout was necessary — but this bailout is an outrage: a lousy deal for the taxpayers, no accountability for management, and just to make things perfect, quite possibly inadequate, so that Citi will be back for more.

Chew and swallow. The business TV channel people loooooove it, so you know we are getting fucked really hard. At least John Boehner has a plan: cut the capital gains tax. If you see Hank Paulson in a bread line, thank him for all the failing banks we now own.

Thank you, Sarah

I would also like to thank her, but for non-Jesusy reasons. Sarah you were always a source of easy humor and if you'd ever leave I'd be sad to see you go. From your inept interviews to your press conferences in front of the Turkey Throat Slitting Jamboroo, you embarrassed enough Independents into electing a Muslim. Thank you, and please make sure that book you're gonna get paid millions for is scratch and sniff or pop-up.

Nate Silver brings the math

With Coleman's margin cut to 180 votes and most, if not all, of the Franken heavy areas of the state to come in, some would say that Al has a pretty good chance of locking this big damn race up. Those people are amateur guesswankers, flogging their limp notions in shame. Nate Silver, he of 538.com and a man who personally has more book deals than you've had hot meals, has decided to end all debate with math. Maths + English. Nate ran the numbers, created some math algorithms, and punched those numbers, plus/minus signs, fractions, an cosines into his computron and popped out a number: 27 votes.

franken_net = t * 8.922 - 3.622

Now, we can attempt to solve this equation at the statewide level. When we plug in a t of .499956 -- Franken was picked on just slightly very less than half of the ballots during the initial count -- we get a value for franken_net of .837. That is, Franken will gain a net of .837 votes for every 10,000 cast. With a total of 2,885,555 ballots having been recorded in the initial count, this works out to a projected gain of 242 votes for Franken statewide. Since Norm Coleman led by 215 votes in the initial count, this suggests that Franken will win by 27 votes once the recount process is complete (including specifically the adjudication of all challenged ballots).

Of course he says, it's all subject to blah blah blah and might not be accurate blah blah, but the man has charts and equations. It's over. Franken wins by 27. Nate Silver is the math Gandalf.

And if Franken does win by 27, I'm burning Nate Silver as a witch. Fair warning.

More Obama appointments

Treasury Secretary: Timothy Geithner. The former NY Fed head has been tapped for the Treasury position. Great news too, as he's described as a skateboarding hipster-wonk, dishing out financial oversight as his carves and grinds your pool with handplants and ollies, wearing oversized Buddy Holly glasses, a too tight Cosby sweater, and listening to Of Montreal. Upon hearing his pick the stock market jumped 400 points because he had a good face and they liked the cut of his jib. This is why you'd be better off betting your savings on a horse. He'll be presiding over the shambles of our economy, trying to link the disparate Hobo Councils into one unified governing collective.

Director Of National Economic Council: Larry Summers. Finally someone got this guy a job where he'll be able to opine that women who were bad at math caused this financial crisis and point out to Obama whether Geithner is doing a Stalefish 360 or a 50-50 Grind.

Press Secretary: Robert Gibbs. America, gaze upon the face of your new doughy pansexual liemaster. It'll be sad saying goodbye to stalwart humorists like McClellan and Perino, but at least we're getting someone who kind of looks like McClellan to lie to us on behalf of a guy we don't despise yet.

Secretary of State: Hill-Dawg. Ok, that one's not new, but sources say she's totally already picking out drapes and shit. I still haven't heard anyone articulate why this is such a great idea, policy wise, to appoint someone whose primary disagreements with Obama were all about foreign policy to State, but we have got a new political reason. In addition to "It'll keep her from meddling with domestic matters", "It'll keep her out of Obama's way in the Senate", and TEAMOFRIVALS!!!! followed by and exultant ejaculation, we can now add "That oughtta shut the bitch up" to our list of great reasons to make someone SecState. Apparently Hill-Dawg being at State will finally give her the high position she apparently wants so bad and now she'll finally go away or something. I heard pundits say it, so it must be true and a good reason.

Do as I command

Go watch this trailer. Black Dynamite starring Michael Jai White. Then thank me later.

This is the story of 1970’s action legend Black Dynamite. When “The Man” murders his brother, pumps heroin into local orphanages, and floods the ghetto with adulterated malt liquor, Black Dynamite is the one hero willing to fight all the way from the blood-soaked city streets to the hallowed halls of the Honky House.

Broken In Brief: Somali Pirates inadvertently seize Dane Cook

XARARDHEERE, SOMALIA--Somali pirates, who have garnered international attention lately after capturing several commercial vessels, made headlines again today after accidentally seizing comedian Dane Cook, who was on break following the filming of My Best Friend's Girl 2 starring Gallagher, Jason Biggs, Jessica Alba, and Eugene Levy.

Using several speedboats, automatic weapons, rocket-propelled grenades, and a shoebox with "originality + relevance" written on the side, the pirates gained control of the inexplicably successful American comic approximately 200 kilometers due east of Somalia's capital, Mogadishu. Sounding slightly surprised and rather disgusted with his booty, pirate leader Abdi Silan issued a statement demanding "fifty euro and a carton of Camels" in exchange for the release of, "um... America's most treasured funnyman." Further threatening "America will pay us the cigarettes or it will never get a chance to see a Good Luck Chuck prequel."

At this writing, both the Indian and American navies had committed resources to encircling the captured comedian, with the former assigning two pontoon boats and the latter an inflatable carnival bouncy thing that, according to Rear Admiral David Folton, "looks kind of like a boat from far away and upside down." Folton added, "We cannot let these Somali pirates take control of America's only source of manic, bland observational humor on the stuff people in their late twenties and early thirties watched as kids. America will not lose it's stockpile Thundercats references and stolen Louis CK material."

Picture of the day

From his halftime interview with Terrel Owens during last night's Steelers victory: Deion Sanders in the new Cliff Huxtable. It's a Cosby sweater!

Your Minnestoa electorate

The recount continues. As of now Coleman's lead has been cut to 136 and Franken is jazzed because the votes came from big Coleman areas and sees a Senate seat in his future when the Frankenophile areas come in. Minnesota Public Radio has an interesting feature on the ballots that are being challenged and the challenge process, like the Lizard People vote above. Apparently the vote was deemed an overvote for both Franken and Lizard People and thusly thrown out. Franken has challenged it.

Lizard People.

Cheap Blogging Crutch 11.21

Hillary Clinton Wins Most Write-In Votes
The Florida write in votes have been tallied and the results are in. Hillary Clinton destroyed the field and is the write in President of Florida. She got 234, with Ron Paul being allowed to have 174 after a conspiracy scrubbed the other million votes. Shamefully Jesus only got 23, his grassroots campaign failing to take hold, and God showed up with an embarrassing 6, barely more than Al Gore. Moot in any event, because writing in God counts as a Republican vote.

EPA Moves to Ease Air Rules for Parks
Last time you went to a national park, didn't you think it needed a coal power plant right on the outskirts? I did, and thank our six vote God, so did the Bush administration. They want to allow heavy polluting concerns to be built by National Parks and weaken air quality restrictions for those parks over the objections of 9 of the 10 regional EPA enviroministers. The Bush Administration in turn laughed, ate a handful of coal, and called their concerns parochial. Fear not, the National Parks Conservation Association plans to file a petition of reconsideration within the EPA, which should allow Obama to overturn it. Or smog just becomes a feature of Yellowstone.

I can has cheezburger ... and pathos?
Salon's Jay Dixit decided to write up an entire article on the Lol-something phenomenon. Not on it, or how it came to be, but on the emotional response she has to the kitties and puppies who have lolspeak pasted over them. The pathos angle. Lolcats as tragic figures of grief and sadness. Way to suck the fun out of something, stay the fuck away from Fuck Yeah Sharks.

Attorney General Michael Mukasey Collapses
Tragedy yesterday as Mukasey reflected on his time as Attorney General, all the things he OK's, the subpoenas he ignored, all the toadying he did, all the laws he allowed to be flagrantly violated, and his Gonzales level of respect for the Justice Department, he suddenly was overcome by intense feelings of guilt, shame, horror, and the realization that he is a scumbag. He promptly collapsed as the weight of his actions dawned on him. Take heart, he's OK and that momentary attack of conscious in behind him, and he's back to work making sure that not one day goes by without the Bush DOJ being horribly politicized.

'Interplanetary internet' passes first test
Finally our dream is here: broadband porn on Mars. Those geniuses at NASA have done it: the space internet! The aim is to allow them to relay information without having to schedule it first and streamline the data process. Already the system is encrypted as to protect our astronauts and Mars landers from space hackers.

Were Neanderthals stoned to death by modern humans?
Want to know why there are no more Neanderthals? We stoned them to death with huge rocks, possibly because they were witches. Aerial rock bombardment was our weapon against our genetically inferior brothers. There is also the hint of a great human/Neanderthal war. Which we totally won with our rocks and spears. Eat it Neanderthals, humans won and promptly forgot about you and how we defeated you. I bet that stings, doesn't it?

Happy Thanksgiving from Sarah Palin

She is the gift that keeps on giving. It's Sarah Palin partaking in the trite ritual of pardoning a turkey that she will not touch or go near. But that's not the best part. No, no. After the ceremony at this turkey farm/Wasilla meth lab, Sarah decided to give a press conference replete with her bog standard nonsensical, gibberish answers. Only she chooses to do it in front of the turkey pen, where the turkey farmers (a per their job) are busy killing all the other turkeys. Slitting their throats, dumping them into a large funnel, and draining the turkey blood into a large vat. Meanwhile she continues the interview, blissfully unaware of what's going on behind her.

Bonus points for MSNBC and their graphic department. "Pardoned turkey is too filthy for Governor Palin to hold" "Governor Palin picks worst possible backdrop for interview" "Turkeys die as Governor Palin takes questions from media" "Turkey killing fowls Palin news conference" "Governor Palin apparently oblivious to turkey carnage over her shoulder" and the immortal "Gov Palin not realizing incongruity of her words versus her backdrop". Bravo work.

Broken News: German recession has Europe fearing a backslide into old behavior

BERLIN—With the German Federal Statistics Office this week revealing a GDP drop of 0.5% this quarter on top of a 0.4% decline in the previous quarter, Germany officially entered into a recession some are predicting will last well into next year.

It is this prospect that has thrown Europe into a state of heightened alert. Not over economic fears, but over the possibility that Germany might relapse, fall back into old habits, and start running with the same old bad crowd again.

“I think we all know what happens when Germany goes into a recession and falls off the wagon,” observed therapist, licensed loveologist, and intervention coordinator Gustavo Romero. “Afterwards we’re piling up big chunks of rubble next to small chunks of rubble, scratching out a whole generation of youth, and affixing large roman numerals to the end of events."

Romero continued, "The important thing is that Germany knows we're here for them in this tough time. Make sure it doesn’t get worse. Make sure they know we’re not going to enable them like that last two times. To remind them of all the progress they made and how every little half a percent drop in GDP doesn’t have to result in them throwing on brown shirts with the Italians in tow and roughing up France for a few Euros to get that next militaristic hit.”

All the warning signs are there. At the last G-8 summit conference in Hokkaido this year Germany was seen hanging around at the back of the ballroom with Italy, smoking cigarettes, cackling loudly, and pointing at France. The two had to be separated when Germany walked over, grabbed a cheese blintz off of the France’s plate, yelled “Mine!" then took a bite and spat it on the floor. That this behavior was exhibited after only one quarter of GDP regression makes it all the more troubling to Europe, Northern Africa, and Russia.

Taking the G-8 summit blintz incident as a warning sign, French President Nicholas Sarkozy has begun reconstruction of its laughably ineffective World War II-era rampart, the Maginot Line. However, instead of concrete walls, machine gun nests, and the French Army, Sarkozy has mobilized the country's disaffected, jobless, rioting French youth from the ghettos and armed them with rocks, unused Bush effigies, and extra-flammable Citroen 2CV’s. Already the Alsace-Lorraine region has been evacuated and is now overrun with Belgian looters.

Poland has even taken steps to bolster its own military to prevent a repeat takeover bid from relapsed Germany. The military has sealed the screen doors on all submarines and installed glass bottoms on the ships of their new Navy, so they’re better able to see the old Polish Navy. Additionally, elite Polish minesweepers have trained a new crop in their time-honored technique of sticking their fingers in their ears and stomping as well as backing up while waving the mine detector in front. They believe they’ve been able to learn from the last war, as all personnel have standing orders not to suspect an invading army of retreating simply because its soldiers are walking in backwards.

Still, some find hope in the fact that a worldwide credit market meltdown could prevent a Germany in recession from funding a massive military build-up.

“My fear is that Germany will get those familiar inklings again and not be able to satisfy them through the international finance system,” warned military analyst Adam Paymer. “They might just bolt from the world community and go hide out in the black market arms bazaars, offering to suck anything waved in front of them in exchange for a TOW missile or an M1A1 Abrams tank. Maybe even start doing countries two-at-a-time for a stick with a pointed edge. Anything to get a fix. I even heard Austria found Wagner CDs in Germany’s room. That’s not a good sign.”

Right now the plan is for the G-20 nations, along with Mr. Romero, to organize an intervention for Germany. Therein they hope to explain their fears, their pain, how Germany has hurt them in the past, and how they don’t want to be hurt by Germany in the future. They hope to then enter Germany into some preventative rehab far away from Italy, Wagner, the Nietzsche books, and all forms of spiked helmets and Neolithic Sanskrit/Hindu luck symbols.

Snub!

Our boy went to the G20 summit and it turns out he's not as popular as he used to be. It seems all those nasty foreigners snubbed George, or he snubbed them because he didn't have enough disinfectant handy. Maybe he said high to all of them backstage, gave them their vaguely racist nickname ("Jappy and Aussie, nice to see you again!"), and thus didn't need to do it all again. Or maybe they were all disappointed they didn't get to meet Obama. Maybe they all just snubbed him because he didn't even know the G20 existed.

Our President everyone. January 20th can't get here fast enough.

The Waxman fan club goes wild

This probably isn't going to be that big of a story as it should be as there are no teams, rivals, or teams of rivals involved, but Henry Waxman has just defeated John Dingell for the chairmanship of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. What does all of this mean? Well namely that this House body holds sway over the five points energy, the environment and health care. Now this isn't going to mean any real change in health care but it is going to make any proposed changes Obama, or the House for that matter, wants to make for the environment and energy, specifically dealing with cars and mileage and emissions standards.

Dingell, more or less, was a Detroit man who stood in the way of things like increasing CAFE standards for mileage and any real substantive action on global warming that affected the car industry. Waxman has no such entanglements, thus we're likely to see a huge new push on the environment and global warming. This will also be helped by the fact that Waxman's former chief of staff, Phil Schiliro, is now Obama's director of legislative affairs. So score one for the good guys, you might not choke to death of smog or drown in a global flood.

The Dutch have cooler money than us

This is the new Dutch five euro commemorative coin by Stani Michiels. It is a portrait of Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands made entirely out of the names of famous Dutch architects. The names are ranked around the circle according to Google hits and will be changed each year according to their popularity. On the back are famous Dutch architecture books arranged around a circle to form an outline of the Netherlands with provinces marked by a bird native to that province.

Us? We get chin bearded street fighters, wooden toothed freaks, guys who get ganked by Aaron Burr, buildings we're sick of seeing, and a menagerie of Illuminati and Freemason symbols meant to lead Nicholas Cage to treasure. All on green with a new smear of peach, red, or blue so some gangster has to spend and extra five seconds on his counterfeiting. Where are my bird provinces, US Mint? Don't even get me started on the Presidential dollar coins. This year is Harrison, Tyler, Polk, and Taylor. That has failure written all over it. At least we'll be able to get Nixon and Dubya dollars. We do have that.

Minnesota: Recountifying Day 1

The Minnesota recount is underway in....uh...Minnesota. In case you forgot, Norm Coleman won by around 215 some votes, declared himself Lord of Minnesota, and started his victory lap around St.Paul. Then they tapped him on the shoulder and told him about the recount and he's just been pissy ever since. As of last night the state has either counted 15.5 or 18 percent of the ballots, depending on the newspaper, and Franken has gained 43 votes or 41 votes depending on the newspaper and is only down now by around 174 or 172. Actually gaining votes is a misnomer, Franken lost 45 votes and Coleman lost 86 votes. Franken lost less. Franken has also challenged 123 Coleman ballots while Coleman has done the same to 143 Franken ballots. Nate Silver has the rundown on the challenge process and has vowed never to sleep until this election is truly over. What's this all mean? Probably nothing, because after the recount is done they'll slap dicks over challenged ballots. But if you want to keep up on the recount, the Star Tribune is keeping tabs as results come in.

Obama: Cabinetry, the Selectioneering

So over the past few days our President Elect has decided to make a few hires. You might not have heard about them because of all the Hillary Clinton Secretary of State, Team of Rivals obsession of our newsmedia. Obama went and filled three spots and I'm having a hard time figuring our how they were rivals of his. I'm beginning to fear this narrative is just meaningless pablum.

Attorney General: Eric Holder. This one was a big shoutout to the millions of Eric Holder fans out there, Obama heard your cries and gave you your beloved Holder. He was a former deputy for Janet Reno under the Clinton White House, may have been involved in the Marc Rich pardon, feels Guantanamo is an international embarrassment, and called for an end to warrantless eavesdropping and rendition. So lefties get to be mad because he's a Clinton retread and righties get to get mad because he's a soft liberal. Everyone wins.

Health and Human Services: Tom Daschle. Not only is he going to be the HHS head but he's also going to be the White House point man on health care. This more or less signals that the Obama White House is going to take passing health care very seriously, not just in designing a plan but it getting it passed. Daschle has sort of reinvented himself into a health policy guru since losing his seat and theoretically knows how to get things passed, despite his constant minority status when he was in office. He does wear red rimmed glasses though, so we'll have to question his judgment.

Homeland Security: Janet Napolitano. She is the current Arizona governor and former Arizona attorney general. Newsies keep mentioning the whole border state/immigration thing as a relevant qualification, so I will as well. She'll have to figure out the complex matrix of figuring out the relation between the President's poll numbers and when to raise the terror alert level. She oughtta have fun trying to make our most disorganized, functionally retarded section of government actually work. Or it'll drive up to the top of a bell tower with a rifle. I don't actually have any Janet Napolitano jokes and I defy you to find anyone who does. Fuck you.

Broken In Brief: Baghdad inexplicably building a subway

BAGHDAD--Today in conjunction with the Iraqi National Parliament and the US Government, the City of Baghdad announced its plans to construct a $3 billion dollar subway system to ease road congestion, lessen pollution, and to modernize its transit capabilities for the 21st century. The subway would consist of two lines of 11 and 13 miles, with 40 overall stops. The plan, while still in developmental stages, has Baghdad residents fearing for their lives.

“Are they out of their fucking minds?” asked concerned citizen Hadji al-Radjhan through a translator. “Let me see if I can get this straight. We’re still in the middle of a massive sectarian conflict that's about to lose what little stability American troops have been able to enforce. We're in our fourth year of a low-level Sunni vs. Shia civil war whose hallmark has been horrific public bombings. Now they want us to huddle together in confined spaces underground, surrounded my large metal trains and concrete? Why not just mail us all a pipe bomb that detonates when it senses our loved ones are close?”

Already the subway has met with great applause from the terrorist, mortician, and militia community. “I just want to thank the Iraqi government for their lack of foresight,” said Samir Nasri of the Mahdi Army. “We have been trying to think of ways to get more, as you Americans say, bang for our buck. With all the craters we've produced, the populace has gotten pretty spread out, even in the urban commercial areas still standing. This is a tremendous boon to the insurgency, which I must remind you: does not exist.”

Lawmakers have announced that they hope to have the project up and running just as soon as the no-bid contracts and kickback structure is organized.

Message of the day

Chuck Norris on Prop 8

Not Gay

Chuck Norris, from his new post over on Townhall with other intellectual heavyweights like Hugh Hewitt, Dennis Prager and Ann Coulter, decided to pontificate on Prop 8. His black belt conservative thesis: gays should shut up and take it, right schmights.

First, there’s the obvious inability of the minority to accept the will of the majority. Californians have spoken twice, through the elections in 2000 and 2008. Nearly every county across the state (including Los Angeles County) voted to amend the state constitution in favor of traditional marriage.

Nevertheless, bitter activists simply cannot accept the outcome as being truly reflective of the general public. So they have placed the brainwashing blame upon the crusading and misleading zealotry of those religious villains: the Catholics, evangelical Protestants, and especially Mormons, who allegedly are robbing the rights of American citizens by merely executing their right to vote and standing upon their moral convictions and traditional views.
...
There were many of us who passionately opposed Obama, but you don’t see us protesting in the streets or crying “unfair.” Rather, we are submitting to a democratic process and now asking how we can support “our” president.

First off Chuck, and I don't know if this is an easy thing to pick up breaking boards and kicking concrete blocks, people don't really respond well to the denial of basic civil rights with a well timed "get over it." They also don't tend to said denial with a shoulder shrug and a "Well if the majority doesn't want us to have basic rights, then I guess it's OK." Giving the majority what it wants no matter what isn't the principle this country was founded on, it was protecting the minority from the tyranny of the majority. At least that's what we pretended when blacks and women got their day in the sun.

Secondly, stripping a group of people from basic rights and protections and refusing to recognize their relationships as valid isn't the same thing as the guy you wanted not getting elected. That's a whole different kind of savate kick. Furthermore, if the religious groups that spent tens of millions of dollars to codify discrimination into the California State Constitution didn't want any blowback, protests, or boycotts from their involvement, well then they shouldn't have stuck their millions into the fight to strip people of rights. Some people just weren't going to like being revoked to second class status and some of those people were going to blame the Mormon church who provided half the donations to Pro-Prop 8 groups and decided to meddle one state over. That's part of a Democracy too, Chuck. Try and think about that when you're doing the DVD commentray for Walker, Texas Ranger Season 17. Then maybe pontificate on how getting mad over people getting mad over having their rights stripped from them, probably isn't the thing to be mad about, from a historical perspective.

These al Qaeda types might not be nice people

In what I'm sure came as a huge shock to Barack Obama, al Qaeda are out in full force calling him racial epithets. I'm sure it's surprising because for the past year he's faced a constant barrage of accusations that not only is he a Muslim, but he wants to negotiate with terrorists, and is al Qaeda's preferred candidate. How shocking to find out they aren't fans.

The message appeared chiefly aimed at persuading Muslims and Arabs that Obama does not represent a change in U.S. policies. Ayman al-Zawahri said in the message, which appeared on militant Web sites, that Obama is "the direct opposite of honorable black Americans" like Malcolm X, the 1960s African-American rights leader.
...
Speaking in Arabic, al-Zawahri uses the term "abeed al-beit," which literally translates as "house slaves." But al-Qaida supplied English subtitles of his speech that included the translation as "house negroes."

The message also includes old footage of speeches by Malcolm X in which he explains the term, saying black slaves who worked in their white masters' house were more servile than those who worked in the fields. Malcolm X used the term to criticize black leaders he accused of not standing up to whites.

First off, I love the fact that they included their own translation so we knew exactly how racist they were getting. Secondly, I like the fact that they had to give a long history of America's racial conflicts and civil rights leaders (with video clips) so their supporters would have the proper context for their "We hate the negro" screed. They also seem to transplant all their Bush hate and criticisms onto Obama. I TOTALLY didn't expect that! You know, I wasn't certain before, but...yeah...now I'm pretty sure al Qaeda are a bunch of dicks. At least they're trying to match our casual racism towards them with some directed back. We needed the racism to get mixed in with the religious and culture hate. Like peanut butter and chocolate coming together in a delicious hateful snack.

O'Reilly on San Francisco

We try to post little bits of satire around here at These Bastards, but sometimes we bow in awe of the masters. Take Bill O'Reilly's "documentary" on San Francisco above. You'll will not find a more twisted, hilarious take on anything ever then O'Reilly's unbelievable take on a city he once wished a terrorist attack on and his serious intonations that this is what Barack Obama wants to turn Nebraska and Mayberry into. Soak it up, a master satirist is at work. San Francisco makes Sodom and Gomorrah look like church picnics.

Buy a Detroit lemon

Detroit Chiefs Plead for Aid

The heads of the Big Three automakers of Detroit pleaded on Tuesday for emergency government aid to stave off potential collapse, but after four hours of testimony, it appeared they had not persuaded enough lawmakers to move quickly on a bailout.

Senate Democratic leaders said they had not been able to muster the support for legislation that would provide $25 billion to the troubled auto industry from the Treasury Department’s $700 billion economic rescue fund.
...
The cause of their misfortunes was not management mistakes, they said, but the weak economy and the inability of consumers to obtain credit to buy cars.

The executives from General Motors, Ford Motor and Chrysler seemed stunned by the general lack of confidence that lawmakers showed in their companies.

Really Detroit? Stunned? You've been hemmoraging money for years, your sales have been slipping for years, you had no business plan beyond "sell huge cars", you stood in the way of making changes towards fuel efficiency standards that would have helped you, and you've openly scoffed at and derided the one market that could save you right now: hybrids. It's all just a credit problem?

Maybe it's the fact that you're all asking for $25 billion and the combined value of your entire companies isn't even $10 billion. How exactly does bailing you out sound like a smart prospect when you're asking for more than double the entire worth of your companies in bailout money? But they swear if you give them the money they can retool and totally won't be some unsustainable zombie company that can only survive through massive government bailouts.

There is a plan to take $25 billion from the $700 billion clusterfuck and give it to Detroit, but Hank Paulson is hugging that money tight and squeezed out a yelping "Nooooooo!". Apparently he has further plans to flush it down a large toilet. But I bet they'll get their money, mostly because they could shitcan 3 million jobs. Then they get to do all the shit they should have done a decade ago on the taxpayer dime. But hey, I totally bet they won't try and stand in the way when CAFE standards are raised or hybrid mandates are made. Honest.

Happy birthday Ted!

Begich defeats Stevens in Senate race

Mark Begich has defeated Sen. Ted Stevens in the election for U.S. Senate.

The Democratic Anchorage mayor widened his lead to 3,724 votes in today's counting of absentee and questioned ballots. The only votes left to count are approximately 2,500 special absentees from people living outside the U.S. or in remote parts of Alaska with no polling place.

The state will count those final ballots on Nov. 25.

Begich issued a statement just before 5 p.m. claiming victory, saying "I am humbled and honored to serve Alaska in the United States Senate."

That's right, Ted "Tubes" Stevens just got defeated. The man had been Alaska's senator practically since it became a state and before that he represented Alaska in Russia's Duma. Now he's free to run for the prison council seat representing E block.

As an added nut shot, today was Ted's 85th birthday. Awwwww. Everyone send Ted a bar of soap large enough to be whittled into a gun and blacked up with shoe polish so he can escape from the Supermax with his Irish Spring scented firearm. Ted can ask for a recount, but it's at the margins where he'd have to pay for it himself. Pity being that all his friends with money are in jail for bribery and kickbacks, so he'll have to dig deep if he really wants it.

Watch out for La Nuestra Familia and the Nazi Lowriders in the showers, Ted. They don't fuck around.

Broken News: Markets rally on strength of machetes, ammunition, stolen MREs

NEW YORK--After a week that saw the Dow Jones Industrial Average buck before eventually settling well below the 9,000 mark, the index staged a massive rally today on the strength of rudimentary survivalist items.

The surge was led early on by bottled water, Spam, and cloth bandage futures, both of which saw their strongest gains since the Cold War era, with rifle ammunition lagging just barely behind. Late trading rode a wave of climbing penicillin, Kevlar, and hatchet prices to a stellar close of 9,565.78, well above analyst projections.

"We honestly didn't see this coming," explained trader Rhett Goldberg, apparently oblivious to the larger economic issues hinted at by this rally. "Most of us were paying attention to General Motors or the banks. Apparently we should have just trusted in capitalism and flowed with the market. It turns out capitalism is never wrong and we're finally seeing proper, conventional adjustments to our new economic reality. From now on I'm focusing on portable generators, bindle-sized handkerchiefs, hobo-grade tins of beans, and chunks of flint. I'll make bonus next year, baby!"

Analysts have been quick to embrace this bear market phenomenon, dumping billions into the survivalist industry practically overnight. Even the recently moribund print media markets are seeing upswings, as the impending need for flammable material to keep warm through winter is causing a rally in anything with a high pulp content.

Few are as elated as Phineas Frank, manager at cottage investment firm, Frank and Berry. "With all the recent market volatility and lousy consumer spending data, it seemed only rational to look into blade sharpeners and water purification tablets. Frankly, and this is just between you and me, I think whoever corners the night vision goggles and crossbow markets is going to be poised to rule. I don't mean that metaphorically. How will you protect your family after the bullets run out and your eyesight is poor because you're vitamin A deficient from a lack of milk, carrots, and generally nutrient-rich food." Frank and Berry, which also has large stakes in the crude gas siphoning and baseball-bat-with-nails-in-it markets, is one of the few firms slated to post substantial profits at year's end.

Clearly, not all investment news is so sunny, as many investment funds have operated to this point as though the American and International economic systems are not, in fact, on the verge of total collapse. Frank attributed this to a near-universal lack of foresight and "the undercurrent of baseless optimism that seems to permeate American investment circles."

Given these late-breaking developments, investors are scrambling to identify new markets to target. Initial indications are that jeep mounted harpoon, studded leather apparel, gyrocopter, and Geiger counter-based securities will soon see renewed interest. In the service sector, analysts predict a dramatic rise in the metal-smithing, CHUD repellent, subterranean construction, mercenary, and black-market markets.

Investors were also seen bailing out of the paper money markets, choosing instead to invest in metals, precious jewels, and shiny rocks. "I just don't see much of a future in paper based monies, or really any kind of monetary system based around capital markets and centralized government. I'm dumping it all into gold futures, silver futures, clamshell futures, especially round pebble futures, and chicken futures," observed industry analyst Dmitri Arshavin. "People don't really think of animals as money anymore, but think of the trade value of eggs! One futures market I'm staying away from is the future futures market. That's a dead zone. No one's really too bullish on the future right now. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go run the numbers on concrete barriers and concertina wire."

In a joint statement released by the White House, Federal Reserve and Treasury Department, the three leaders of these institutions hailed today's advances as "...proof that the fundamentals of capitalism are strong and can withstand anything." Furthermore they also stated that when society is rebuilt in the future, either by a new race or by a loose confederation of human tribes, that they hope this future society will entrust their financial growth and economic stability to the very principles that are being shown by the market today.

Oh, happy Lieberday!

Lieberman Keeps Committee Chair In Senate Vote

Sen. Joe Lieberman will keep his chairmanship of the Senate Homeland Security Committee despite hard feelings over his support for GOP nominee John McCain during the presidential campaign.

The Connecticut independent will lose a minor panel post as punishment for criticizing Obama this fall.

Lieberman's colleagues in the Democratic caucus voted 42-13 Tuesday to approve a resolution condemning statements made by Lieberman during the campaign but allowing him to keep the Homeland Security Committee gavel. He will leave the Environment and Public Works panel, however.

Congratulations Democrats, you win big and you still find a way to fuck yourselves. In his typical classy form, Joe went out and immediately claimed it was all a big conspiracy against him and that he didn't really say all that stuff people were saying he said. He's innocent, you see. At least Joe got what he wanted: a platform to criticize the party from within the party and a committee seat which I'm sure he'll remember to use now that a Democrat is in office. I really must commend Harry Reid and PE Obama, Bre'r Lieberman told you he was going to stride off into the briar patch and you decided to save him from the danger. Now he gets to dick you around for 4 years because that's clearly been his modus operandi for the past 2 and he knew you didn't have the spine to treat him like he treated you. Try not to act too surprised when he leaves you hanging yet again..

Cheap Blogging Crutch 11.18

After Obama's win, white backlash festers in US
You stay classy white people. The Christian Science Monitor documents some of the 200 hate-related incidents that have sparked up since we done elected a black guy. Included are 4 college students who sprayed racist graffiti, cross burnings, high schoolers who got a visit from the Secret Service after posting inappropriate comments online, and two bloggers who constantly compared Obama to Cyrus from the Warriors. Also referenced in the article is the expected upswing in racist organizations and how groups like Stormfront and the League of the South are experiencing server crashes because of all the new interest. Post-racial? No friends, still racial racial. Hope you didn't get too enamored with the capacity of the South for reason.

The Case Against Hot Pockets
In case you were wondering, the foreign makers of Hot Pockets are laughing at you for eating them. Plus, the stuff they cram into them are just some Danish guy's guesses on based around a stereotypical notion of what fat American idiots eat. The Hot Pockets themselves are probably laughing at you. Everyone's laughing at you. Hooooooot Pock-ets!

Is Obama the Antichrist?
Thanks Newsweek, I really needed you to delve into whether some deranged God humpers really think Barack Obama is the anti-Christ. Thanks for also treating the subject with the same seriousness you would treat a story on a cancer cure. The lottery numbers were 666? You even got serious analysis from Jerry Falwell's Liberty university. That's all the info I need. Crucify him!

Can Mall Be Filled For an Inauguration? 4 Million May Try It.
Some people are expecting that 1% of the American populace will turn out on the Mall in DC to hear Obama give his Hopiest speech ever. 4 million. Well actually, maybe a million will be able to actually see him at the edge of the horizon. 1.5 million will actually be able to perceive his words audibly ("Blessed are the cheesemakers?"). The rest will be standing all the way back in Fredricksburg and Baltimore seeing nothing and hearing nothing, wondering why they didn't just watch it on TV. I know it's historical and all, but you all aren't going to be at the front.

Aww, now where are these people going to get paid to hate?

Sad news everyone. Focus on the Family, America's favorite Dobson related religious bigot breeding ground, is going to have to lay off 20% of it's workforce. I know, it's emotional. Apparently exploiting Christian beliefs for the enrichment and power of James Dobson isn't a lucrative market now with the Democrats in charge. What's even more shocking is that while they don't have the money to pay 20% of their employees, they certainly did have the money to rail against Prop 8 in California. Not Mormon sized money, but money nonetheless.

In all, Focus pumped $539,000 in cash and another $83,000 worth of non-monetary support into the measure to overturn a California Supreme Court ruling that allowed gays and lesbians to marry in that state. The group was the seventh-largest donor to the effort in the country. In addition Elsa Prince, the auto parts heiress and longtime funder of conservative social causes who sits on the Focus on the Family board, contributed another $450,000 to Prop. 8.

Here's some of what they did

Helped found (in 2003) the organization that led this campaign;
Paid for early polling to determine the best ballot language and strategy;
Assisted with a major fundraising event for the campaign;
Encouraged pastors to get involved (which they did in remarkable ways);
Aired broadcasts urging financial and prayer support from around the country; and
Provided major coverage of the campaign via radio, Internet, mail and Focus magazines

I can't tell, does this fall into the minor reaping what you sow or getting just desserts categories? Here's hoping God curses you with more layoffs, you deserve it.

D-Day for Liberman

Today all the Senators meet in the secret chambers beneath Washington to vote on whether or not Joe Lieberman gets dipped slowly into a hot vat of acid or given a bag of money. Also whether or not he keeps his seat on the Homeland Security Committee. Democrats like Pat Leahy, Byron Dorgan, and Tom Carper all believe Holy Joe should face some sort of consequences for his constant campaigning for McCain, his slamming, dissembling, and lying about Obama and his policies, his RNC speech, his campaigning for Republican senators like Norm Coleman, and stuff like his statement that he didn't know if the US could survive 60 Democrats in the Senate. They generally think a man who does this shouldn't really be rewarded with a committee post that came about as a result of Democratic control, when all Joe did was fight for Republican control. Also, he already had the chair and did absolutely nothing with it for 2 years.

There are senators like Amy Klobuchar and Evan Bayh who think that Lieberman should be let back in if he makes a really sincere apology and says he's really really sorry. Others just think he should be let back in anyway, because they're Democrats and are terminally stupid. Reid already discussed stripping Joe of his chairmanship and he reportedly threw a snit and threatened to go over to the Republicans.

His empty threat to go join with a group of powerless individuals with no committee chairs and dooming himself to election defeat in his home state apparently scared some of the Democratic caucus and because they are big spineless lady boys they are expected to let him stay, give him control over Homeland Security, and at worst strip him of his Environment and Public Works subcommittee chairmanship. Though if he stamps his feet and holds his breath over that the Democrats will probably make him Majority Leader instead, perhaps impeaching Obama and replacing him with Lieberman. Obama should be thrilled with that since he made so many calls to people asking to keep Mr. Sanctimonious in the caucus.

So unless there's a major finding of a spine in the next few hours, Joe Lieberman gets everything he wants. I'm sure all those Senate Democrats are going to be real surprised when he continues to dick them over in the Homeland Security Committee and generally act like the personification of smug self-centered obsession. You earned it Democrats. Congrats.

Broken In Brief: Bush organizes, ruins one car funeral

WASHINGTON--In what has become the long expected coda of the Bush Administration, today President Bush took it upon himself to organize and execute a one car funeral, then promptly bungled it beyond all recognition. The "funeral" was to be a mass cremation for the deluge of hobo and drifter bodies that were found discarded near the Naval Observatory last week. The President, attempting once and for all to prove to the nation that he could in fact do something right, organized both the route and drove the U-Haul van full of bodies to the crematorium at the Foggy Bottom Funeral Home.

The normal route from the morgue to the funeral home takes you 3 miles and 15 minutes worth of time to get there. The Bush route covered 77 miles along some of the most treacherous mountaintop roads in the world, which were negotiated at top speed. At approximately 9:16 am this morning, Bush finally lost control of the van on the outskirts of Virginia's Prince William Forest Park, pitching it into a small ravine and barrel rolling it down a hill before it toppled to a stop, hobo bodies littering the area.

As a dazed Bush was awoken by Forest Rangers, he reportedly told them that "They didn't see nuthin'", before shooing away a pack of wolves that had begun feasting on the cadavers. The president then proceeded to set the remnants of the van and the bodies on fire, declaring "Mission accomplished" before escaping into the woods, where he was later recovered by the Secret Service. Declaring that the original intent of burning the bodies had been reached and with the added bonus of feeding an endangered species, the President has announced he will award himself the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his actions.

Punk rock

SEC v. Cuban

Looks as though Pittsburgh's richest son is in trouble...

The Securities and Exchange Commission said Monday that it had charged Mark Cuban, the billionaire Internet entrepreneur and owner of the Dallas Mavericks basketball team, with insider trading for selling 600,000 shares of an Internet search engine company.

The S.E.C. said Mr. Cuban sold the stock in the company, Mamma.com, based on nonpublic information about an impending stock offering. The commission asserted that Mr. Cuban avoided losses in excess of $750,000 by selling his stock prior to the public announcement of the offering.

This all seems kind of silly. Given Cuban's wealth -- he's estimated to be worth about $2.3 billion (with a B) -- unloading stock to avoid losing 3/4 of a mil is kind of like Matthew tipping his prostitute four dollars instead of five because the guy still had most of his teeth. In other words, unnecessary. But funny. Very funny.

One would think someone of Cuban's stature would have done the quick math and realized he's likely to spend at least 750 grand on lawyers now that the SEC is coming for that ass. Not surprisingly, Cuban is denying all charges.

Bailout Accounting

You poor naive bastards. You really thought the bailout was just $700 billion? Oh no, according to CNBC the total payout is closer to $4.28 trillion. $4,284,500,000,000 to be exact. 68% of that sum is under the purview of the Fed, while 16% is being used in the Treasury Asset Relief Program (TARP), while the remaining 16% is being bet on horses and being used to fortify buses and vans with appropriate armor and weaponry to dominate the streets and subjugate the teeming masses in the upcoming food riots.

It's a shame we elected one of those tax and spend liberals instead of one of those fiscal conservatives. We'd be out of this in no time. Unfortunately President Obama will have to sell large swaths of this country to the Chinese. Sorry Middle America, Hu Jintao owns you know. I hope you like dog beds with your names on them. That's where you will sleep now.

Below the jump there's a handy chart to know exactly where your money is being squandered.

Government Entity	Sum in Billions of Dollars
Federal Reserve
(TAF) Term Auction Facility	900
Discount Window Lending
Commercial Banks	99.2
Investment Banks	56.7
Loans to buy ABCP	76.5
AIG	112.5
Bear Stearns	29.5
(TSLF) Term Securities Lending Facility	225
Swap Lines	613
(MMIFF) Money Market Investor Funding Facility	540
Commercial Paper Funding Facility	257
(TARP) Treasury Asset Relief Program	700
Other:
Automakers	25
(FHA) Federal Housing Administration	300
Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac	350
Total	4284.5

Vegas says thanks

Referee: Polamalu's INT return should have counted for Steelers

The first 11-10 game in NFL history shouldn't have ended that way, referee Scott Green said after a last-minute touchdown was errantly taken away from the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday.

The officiating mistake didn't affect the outcome since the Steelers still would have won, but the touchdown would have changed the score to 17-10 -- or, more likely, 18-10, since the teams were lined up for an extra-point try that was never attempted.

Still, even though it happened at the end of the game the points won't be given back to the Steelers. Hope you didn't bet any money on the Steelers to cover the 4.5 point spread, otherwise the NFL just fucked you in the ass. According to Pregame.com this blown call resulted in a $64 million dollar swing in favor of the bookies. Vegas says thanks Mr. Goodell, a briefcase full of money and a Dominican midget hooker are in the Hummer out back.