Today in ironic BP humor

Via Rachael Maddow and Dot Earth comes this looks at prominently displayed signs at BP stations.



The funny part is that we're going to be responsible for their spill. Well, maybe not as much funny as deeply tragic. I must not have told the joke right.

Congress brings the funny

Ahh, the Google "I can't believe the information suppressing and spying government of China tried to suppress information and spy after we built them a system to help them suppress information and spy" hissy fit. How could Google have ever foreseen a future in which China wouldn't be content to merely partake in the OK kind of spying and censorship that Google was fine with and move into the bad kind of spying and censorship that Google doesn't like?

But there is much humor to be mined from the situation. Much of it gallows humor over freedom and the ridiculously naive praise Google seems to be getting for standing up to China... after spending years enabling and helping China. But in an article about the Google-China showdown, our own government decided to bring the irony with all the subtlety of a knee to the groin.

The Google-China flap has already reignited the debate over global censorship, reinvigorating human rights groups drawing attention to abuses in the country and prompting U.S. politicians to take a hard look at trade relations. The Obama administration issued statements of support for Google, and members of Congress are pushing to revive a bill banning U.S. tech companies from working with governments that digitally spy on their citizens.

So... Google can't work with the US government? Ah well, it's for the best. Google needs to be affiliated with as few shady governments as possible. There's been too much bad press already.

Get fucked, happy people

Finally, an explanation for why despite a decade-long chemical campaign against healthy brain function, one that has yielded a multitude of events which would best be forgotten, I can still readily recall virtually every petty, inconsequential event that has transpired since my birth.

SYDNEY (Reuters Life!) - Bad moods can actually be good for you, with an Australian study finding that being sad make people less gullible, improves their ability to judge others and also boosts memory.

The grand irony here is that news of this puts me in a good mood, one compounded by the knowledge that the pleasantness won't last and the bad mood will return... which pleases me. Yet I'm troubled by all of this sudden optimism and-- fuck it, I need to lie down. In a bar.

Culinary wizardry

Butter balls: it's not just a nickname the longshoremen gave Sean

Do you see what Texas gets up to when we leave it alone for a few seconds to deal with a flaming California?

Deep fried butter is among eight creative treats available at the Texas State Fair. “100 percent pure butter is whipped 'til light and fluffy, then specially sweetened with a choice of several flavors.” It is then surrounded by a “special dough” and quick-fried.

That's it Texas, you're so close. You've almost figured out a way to kill yourselves with food. I would have thought putting a gun in your mouth would be quicker, but you guys like it slow and painful. It's funny, you eat like a people who are going to need expensive end of life care, but you vote to oppose better health coverage and palliative care. Ah well, at least you decided to make your irony taste buttery instead of bitter.

Yes, this product actually exists

It's official, clearly advertised on the Eagles website, and no, you can't get it personalized to say "Vick 7" or "Mexico 7" on the back. Only humans are allowed to look that dumb. Sure they signed a reviled dog killer/subpar NFL QB, but don't they at least want to go the whole 9 and have complete ironic/kitschy fun with it?

It's unclear if the Eagles will release a team branded rape stand or fight pit mat.

Cheap Blogging Crutch 08.10

Obama wants to kill your grandma
Salon kindly takes on the five biggest myths going on in the health care "debate" going on right now. And by myths they mean "right wing lies". Among them: Obama murdering your grandmother while he loots your wallet to pay for abortions and the upcoming ban of all private insurance. Now that these have been debunked in one big grouping, in addition to all the other places they've been debunked in smaller chunks, I'm sure they'll never be mentioned again by a disgraced former Speaker of the House or a barely literate former Alaskan Governor.

Welcome to GovernorRod.com Live!
After some asshole judge scuttled his change to speak to the people through the vessel that is I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here, Rod Blagojevitch had no means to speak to the masses....until now. That's right, he desperately wants you to believe his ouster was controversial and that he's a man of the people fighting for the issues of the people. Provided that the people left and unmarked, non-sequential stack of hundreds behind the refrigerator in the warehouse out back.

Gladney The Uninsured Activist
The Washington Monthly kindly points us to a story of a man named Kenneth Gladney, a right wing health care activist who decided it would be a bright idea to start a fight with members of the SEIU. Now even though video of the "fight" shows you that it's generous to even claim it reached the level of "scuffle", Gladney is now being carted around in a wheelchair as a shining example of the blah blah blah something something boo health care. Of interest is that at his appearance he was soliciting donations...for his own health care. It seems ole Kenny has just been laid off and lost his health insurance. Ah yes, sweet irony, how I missed your gentile kiss. I wonder how much all the medical procedures involved in fixing someone who shot themselves in the foot cost?

Averting the Worst
The Krugbot is willing to say it: we have averted the Second Great Depression. And what saved us in the end? Big Government, with its plan to bend this country over and shove money up its financial institutions until all was well again. The onslaught of a dystopian future and the hobo barter economy that we had all been preparing for is no more. "Utter catastrophe no longer seems likely." *sigh* There's always next time. Don't throw away those tin cans of beans and deluxe bindles yet, there's probably some new financial crisis cresting over the horizon.

Drug Industry to Run Ads Favoring White House Plan
So what did the White House get us all when they told the pharmaceutical companies that they wouldn't have to make any more concessions than $80 billion over 10 years and in return have no government negotiation of drug prices? $150 million in ads supporting health care. Gee....uh...thanks. So much better than cheaper prescription drugs. I can only hope these ads that drug companies are forced to run are as effective as those "Truth" ads that cigarette companies are forced to run.

Sounds like a good idea...that will never happen

General Ricardo Sanchez has added his name to the list of people calling for useful ideas that will never ever ever be allowed to happen. His idea? A Truth Commission thingy to investigate all those interrogation and torture related war crime type activities. It's not quite as good as my idea that will never happen (arresting them, charging them all in a court, and throwing them in prison) but it's a start.

In front of a packed audience tonight at the Times Center in New York City, General Ricardo Sanchez, the former commander of all coalition forces in Iraq, called for a truth commission to investigate the abuses and torture which occurred there.

The General described the failures at all levels of civilian and military command that led to the abuses in Iraq, "and that is why I support the formation of a truth commission."

The General went on to say that, "during my time in Iraq there was not one instance of actionable intelligence that came out of these interrogation techniques."..."If we do not find out what happened," continued the General, "then we are doomed to repeat it."
...
Senator Patrick Leahy has called for a truth commission on the abuses in Iraq and set up a website to collect online signatures in support of the framework -- www.BushTruthCommission.com. More than 113,000 people have signed so far since the site's launch in February of this year.

As if we need another reason to fully explore to what extent we defecated on the founding fathers, our Constitution, and the Geneva Conventions, there is one added bonus to having a Truth Commission: irony will finally be killed for good when guys like Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld go to something called a "Truth Commission", where there are no repercussions/prosecutions for telling the truth, and will proceed to lie their asses off. Sure, sure, wiretapping, torture, rendition, blah blah blah. But also: world record attempts at bullshitting and obfuscation. The Scumbag Liar Olympics. We need this for truth, but mostly for comedy.

Alberto Gonzales......

Alberto Gonzales has popped his head out from behind whatever tenement shack door he's been squatting in for the past few months to ask if you could spare any change...oh and to opine on a new Supreme Court Justice. Apparently the fact that Obama used "empathy" as one of the qualities he looks for in a justice is THE WORST THING EVER. Gonzales doesn't want no empathetic judge on the court, it would lead to chaos.

GONZALES: I do worry a little bit, well, I worry, I worry about about justices on the court making decisions based on what they think makes them feel good. I don’t think it’s fair to expect society to anticipate the outcome of a case based upon what makes a justice feel good. In essence what you’re saying, I think, is that I’m going to, I don’t care what the law says, I’m going to come out, I’m going to pursue an outcome that I think is fair and just. I’m going to rewrite the law. And I think that’s dangerous.

I'm just going to let that one sit there for a minute. Let it soak in.

RIP Irony
1107 BC - 2009 AD
Beloved by all
Murdered by Alberto Gonzales in cold blood

Poor 'lil guy. Couldn't withstand the sheer ignorant force of what Gonzales said.

Quote of the day

Jane Harman (D-CA) on voting to authorize and cover up illegal warrantless wiretapping and the sense of betrayal she feels because they decided to use it to illegally wiretap against her.

HARMAN: I'm just very disappointed that my country -- I'm an American citizen just like you are -- could have permitted what I think is a gross abuse of power in recent years. I'm one member of Congress who may be caught up in it, but I have a bully pulpit and I can fight back. I'm thinking about others who have no bully pulpit and may not be aware, as I was not, that right now somewhere, someone's listening in on their conversations, and they're innocent Americans.

And off in the distance we hear the violent explosion of the world's first machine that measures irony. This woman didn't give two shits when she thought the government was just going to illegally spy on the peasant class, but when she finds out they used it to investigate her shady dealings on behalf of AIPAC: OUTRAGE!!!!!!!! at the betrayal of American values and gross abuse of power that she was totally aware of and supported wholeheartedly.

Don't like them wiretapping you? Well, I guess you shouldn't have voted to allow them to. Now you'll have to excuse me Jane, my sides are starting to hurt from laughing too hard.

Horrible irony two-fer

Man Who Campaigned To Protect Sharks Is Snatched By Great White

A snorkeller is believed to have been snatched by a shark as he swam last weekend with his son at a beach south of Perth. Witnesses reported seeing a dorsal fin and thrashing in the water before the sea turned red and the man vanished at the scene on Australia's west coast.

Father-of three Brian Guest, 51, who had campaigned for many years for the protection of sharks, had been looking for crabs on yesterday morning with his 24-year-old son when he was attacked about 30 metres from the shore.

NPR Reporter Laid Off While Reporting Layoffs

In September, Ketzel Levine, a senior correspondent for National Public Radio, came up with an idea for a series about how Americans were handling economic pressure. Called “American Moxie: How We Get By,” it began in early December. The subjects were people like an Illinois farmer who loved tending to his cows, but was having to sell them. “My idea was to look at how we adjust, how we change, what we have to dig deep and find in order to do what it takes to get by, and that’s where moxie came in,” Ms. Levine said.

But there was an unexpected ending. Midway through her reporting, Ms. Levine found out that she had been laid off as part of a 64-employee cut at NPR.

Elitist thinks Obama is an elitist

Obama is going to have to fend off that elitism charge yet again. The devastating wielder of the charge this time? Lynn Forester de Rothschild of the rich ass, old old old old money, banking and finance Rothschild's.

“This is a hard decision for me personally because frankly I don't like him,” she said of Obama in an interview with CNN’s Joe Johns. “I feel like he is an elitist. I feel like he has not given me reason to trust him.”

Of course Barack Obama suffers from not being Hillary Clinton. Rothschild is one of the tragically named Hillraisers, rich people who raise massive sums of money for Hillary Clinton. I guess she would know, having married into one of the names quintessentially linked to rich elitism in world history. Were the Rockefellers all hitched up?

Listen I know you're still bitter that Hill-Dawg went down. And Obama is going to raise your taxes, what with you being massively rich and all. But get over it, you aren't helping her, helping McCain, or hurting Obama. Your name is de Rothschild, the joke writes itself. This isn't even funny or original satire and we should know, we traffic in it up to five times a week.

Of note

Lehman Brothers was founded in 1850 and survived the Great Depression. It was not able to survive the subprime mortgage crisis and the deregulation caused by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act.