I grew up most of my life thinking that New Jersey drivers were the worst in the country.  That was before I moved to Maryland I realized the horrible truth – this state has the most hideously braindead drivers I have ever encountered.  First off, I should say I have never driven in New York, Massachusetts, or California so I can’t judge conclusively (although just being a passenger in Boston was terrifying).  I have driven in the following states: Pennsylvania (eastern and western sides - and yes, there’s a difference), New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida.  Driving in Maryland is by far the worst experience I’ve had and to calm my ever-growing road rage (so I don’t end up like this guy), I’m going to give you my list of why driving in Maryland is the worst experience:

1. There is no passing lane.  Just two lanes of cars going the same speed (5 miles per hour under the speed limit).


2. There are no shoulders anywhere.  Meaning, if someone decides to make a left hand turn into the local biker bar, the traffic will back up for half a mile leaving you with the choice of driving into huge pot holes and wrecking your car (especially if you are one of the 5 people in the area who aren’t driving a ginormous pick-up truck) and waiting for 2 minutes while the person backing up traffic waits for a 20 second break in traffic to make his painfully slow left-hand turn.


3. Unless you are on an interstate, the “highways” are either one lane or have traffic lights every twenty feet.  Every road is a windey, back road.


4. It is important for a Maryland driver to go at least 5 miles per hour under the speed limit, especially when the speed limit is 25 miles per hour on a long, straight road.


5. It takes the typical Marylander about 3 seconds to notice when a red light turn green.  It then takes that driver about 5 seconds to make a left-hand turn.


6. Turn signals are about as common on Maryland roads as horses.  If a turn signal goes on, it stays on.


7. All Marylanders brake when aproaching a traffic light no matter what color it is.  True story: I once was behind a driver that came to a full and complete stop at a light that was literally green the entire time it was in my sight.  I have never seen a Maryland driver hustle to make it through a yellow light, preferring instead to slam on their brakes.


8. When parking, the Maryland driver has yet to discover “the pull through,” instead usually choosing to block traffic for 30 seconds while he backs up into a parking space.  And yes, I’ve actually seen this done in spots that had available pull throughs.


9. When making a turn on red, the Maryland driver will wait a good 2 full seconds after an opening in traffic has started to begin pulling out and cutting off the next car.


10. A quarter inch of snow?  Hell, any precipitation whatsoever?  Forget about it.  They go nuts.


11. They all do what I like to call the “Maryland Meander.”  Meaning, they have absolutely no concept of where the lines are in roads.  Virtually every time I’m on I-83 driving south there is some clown driving in both lanes, making it impossible to pass.

Of course, driving in Pennsylvania isn’t perfect but rarely did I ever get as pissed off as I seem to get on a daily basis down here.  The one up side is the quality of roads, but I’d rather get to my destination quickly on a crappy road then have a smooth ride and take 45 minutes to travel 10 miles.

I also found this excerpt from an article that completely rips on Baltimore (most of it I think is unfair, but is spot on in this paragraph):

Speaking of traffic violations, anyone who’s ever driven through Maryland on a major highway has probably seen more brake lights than you’d spot at senior-citizen discount day at the local Stop & Shop. The thought process of your average Maryland driver: ‘Eek, someone’s merging onto the highway; I better hit my brakes. Oh! there’s an accident on the other side of the road; I better hit my brakes and gawk. Ahh, police car; I better slow down to 45 miles per hour in a 65 zone, even though I was only going 60 to begin with.’ Forget any entries to the Beltway: People drive the same route everyday and they know their 695 exit is a left exit, but here they are, in the far right lane. Blinkers: Why bother? ‘Those no-turn-on-red signs be damned: Aren’t all turns made on red? Red? Oh, that light was red? Hm, well, eight cars are going to go through, anyway. Oh, I’m blocking the box. Isn’t that what all of the space in the middle of the intersection is for, my car? ‘

I guess the bottom line is that I’d rather be behind a New Jersey driver and in front of a Maryland driver.  In neither situation would I be in close proximity with their vehicles for very long. 

-MPAW

  

Foamy is ranting again and he actually hits on some very good points about legal and illegal drug use. It’s sad that a humor flash web site makes more sense than Tom Cruise does on the matter. Oh, and if you’re a Foamy virgin and you’re sensitive about such things, beware of adult verbiage.

IllWillPress.com: Drugs in your Head

-MPAW

  

Fox has announced that they are going to remake the 1976 spiritual warfare/horror flick, The Omen with the director of “Behind Enemy Lines.” I have to admit being a pseudo-casual fan of this series (although I haven’t seen it since the early college days). It’s hard to argue with a series featuring the likes of Gregory Peck and Sam Neill. The original also launched the career of Richard “Superman” Donner. I’m not really for or against a remake, but I think it’s really unnecessary. (There are more disturbing movies on the horizon that I’m more worried about. Namely, I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer, Hollow Man 2, and perhaps most disturbing of all, Road House 2: Last Call).

Anyway, it occured to me that if this series is successful and they actually remake all three films, then Hollywood will officially be so bankrupt ideas that they’re remaking movies from the `80’s (which I believe would be a first). Maybe it’s because it’s my birthday but I’m starting to freak out that they’re inching towards remaking movies that I grew up with. Beyond my quarter-life crisis though, is it really necessary to remake films that are only 25 years old? I mean, how long before we start seeing remakes of Back to the Future or E.T.?

What I’m ultimately driving at here is that I’m sick of Hollywood whining about not making as much money as they did in 2004, even though ticket prices are constantly climbing, when they refuse to do any original thinking. Seriously, what was the last truly original and fresh thing to come out of Hollywood? Probably The Matrix. That’s been done to death superficially but while the special effects got all the glory in The Matrix’s success, it was a thought-provoking and original story that propelled it.

Bottom line, Hollywood: if you want us to come out to the theaters, stop worrying about making the movies look like video games or rehashing the same stories you did three decades ago. Ignore all the other stupid factors you’re trying to blame for the decrease in attendance and try producing something that’s fresh, creative, and worth my money. You are not making money because your product sucks. Period.

Variety: Remake an ‘Omen’ for helmer
ComingSoon.net: Hollow Man & Road House Sequels Coming

-MPAW

  

In a rare non-Insider article feature at ESPN.com, Gene Wojciechowski hits the nail on the head complaining about cell phone users at ballgames. The following paragraph sums things up quite nicely:

I’m funny this way, but I like to go to a ball game to actually watch the ball game. I don’t need a cell, a Crackberry, or a Palm to get me through it. I don’t need to text message. All I really need is a beer vendor with a good memory.

ESPN.com: Fans dialing wrong number when calling from games

I have quite a few pet peeves when it comes to public sports watching. Cell phones are one of them, but I’d like to expound on a few more of them:

1. The Wave
   I have to say my biggest pet peeve is misuse of the wave. It is my opinion that the wave should only be used in cases of extreme boredom (i.e. a blow out of a game, in between innings, or perhaps a rain delay). My problem with the wave, like the cell phones, stems from people who just aren’t into the game. It would be like a total stranger starting a conversation with you in a movie theater. Not only are they not paying attention to what they paid to see, not only is it distracting to your experience, but they get upset when you don’t participate! If you don’t want to pay attention, fine but let me be a good fan at least! The last game I was at it was as if they were specifically waiting for an Orioles rally to start (this was during a great 0-0 game at the time by the way) and as soon as the inning ended, they stopped. Grrrr. Please note that this pet peeve does not include Beaver Stadium. The Lions have sucked long enough so that the fans deserve a distraction from the agony once the tailgating drunkenness starts to wear off.
   




2. Repeat Face Stuffers
   Violators of this pet peeve should be universally rejected by humanity. This is the guy who gets up for food every freaking inning. Usually it’s some middle aged yuppie buying Dippin’ Dots and nachos for his trophy wife and brat kids. He never leaves between innings. Usually his head obstructs your view right as the pitcher goes into his windup. He proceeds to do this throughout the game. Again, the crux of the issue is PAY ATTENTION TO THE FREAKIN’ GAME!! You can maintain the considerable girth of your elephantine children (and in a much more cost-efficient way) at home.






3. Early Departures
   Like the Wave, this peeve is excusable in the case of a blow out. Coming from a family who religiously believes in the early departure technique to avoid traffic, I’ve been on both sides of this but when I’m driving, I like to stay until the last pitch when my team is winning, and at least until the first out is made in the 9th inning if my team is losing. Again, the last game I was at was a clinic for bad fan behavior as the people sitting next to me left at the end of the 6th inning – meaning they missed a whole third of the game. They probably leave at halftime during football games. At no point should a departure before the 7th inning stretch be allowed – even during a blow out (I’m looking at you, Dodgers fans).
   

I have more, but I’ll leave it at that for now. If you’re guilty of any of these things, don’t sit next to me because you are part of the problem.

-MPAW

  

Remember the good ol’ days back here on the blog? Last summer I averaged about 4 posts a day writing about the election, pimping George W. Bush and the Republicans while giving you about 200,000 reasons to vote against John Kerry and the Democrats (and one of these days I’ll actually put the archives back up when I have a free weekend . . . scheduled for 2009). You may have noticed that the political rants have died down a bit here. It would be understandable after the election. For one, I was completely burnt out on politics and second, there wasn’t much going on in Washington until everyone was sworn in. The reason why I’ve written more about 24, Star Wars, baseball, Qatarian (Qatarish?) camel jockey child molestation, and freakin’ assless Brazilian pants is because politics today would disgust me if I wasn’t training myself to be apathetic.

What’s finally pushed me over the edge is this judge confirmation “compromise” (read: betrayal) by McCain and company in the Senate. What has been driving me mad for the past half year is the talk that waiting to use the “nuclear option” (who was the marketing genius behind that one? Probably the same folks who termed the phrase the “Dark Side” of the Force) was good politics. Winning elections is a means, not an end. If you’re not going to enact your agenda within the first 6 months of your term then when the hell are you going to do it? There’s always going to be a major election less than two years away. The problem is that politicians are using issues to get elected instead of getting elected to move on issues.

I’m a realist and understand that you can’t just march into Washington and within 100 days just slam every initiative in your agenda into effect, but don’t you think that given the fact that a plurality of Republican voters voted the way they did because of outrage over moral issues (i.e. judicial activism with gay marriage), that this would be a line to be drawn? The answer of course, is yes and for the first time in my life I’m considering going Independent. Yes, I know “only” seven Republicans betrayed us, but if the GOP leadership can’t keep their members in order, what good is the party? I’m so tired of hearing election after election, “We need more seats.” For two election cycles we kept hearing that we needed a bigger majority in the Senate for judicial confirmations (understandably), but now that we have a 55 – 45 advantage there’s no excuse for not moving on this. A 60 - 40 advantage is a bit much to ask if you ask me.

As for the deal itself, it basically boils down to this: the Democrats agree to allow a vote on 3 of the 10 controversial nominees and not to filibuster except for “extraordinary circumstances” and Republicans are banned from using the nuclear option unless it feels the Democrats break the deal. But seriously, what do you have a greater faith in – the Democrats calling “extraordinary circumstances” or the Republicans having the balls to pull the trigger on the nuclear option. I’m going with the former because it’s the GOP’s lack of testicles that led to this asinine compromise. In fact, they’re already blocking the approval of John Bolton. Boy, that was a great 36 hours of peace guys. Thanks.

I’m so freakin’ tired of the political game. I’m not a Republican; I’m a Conservative. The GOP is the best vessle available to spread Conservative principles, but when the party sells us out after how hard we’ve fought over the past 10 years since the Gingrich Revolution, it makes me second-guess whether it’s even worth it to invest my time with this group of two-faced losers.

So that’s where I am right now. Am I crazy? Am I overreacting here? If you can find some light at the end of this tunnel, please let me know where I’m wrong because I want to be a believer. If something happens that causes me to change my attitude I’ll let you know, but I’d prepare myself for a long summer of baseball posts.

-MPAW

  

. . . because my head is about to explode. You may remember a while back I wrote about the Minutemen Project that helps patrol our border with Mexico and then reports any illegal activity to the real border patrol who then deals with the problem. As I wrote before, the Minutemen are true patriots doing the job the government refuses to do.

If the following report is true, then it is absolutely outrageous. According to The Washington Times, members of the Arizona border control have been ordered not to make any arrests. The reason being that their superiors don’t want the numbers to prove the Minutemen to be effective.

The current incompetency of the border patrol is one thing. The fact that they are intentionally NOT doing the job they’re paid to do and their DUTY to protect this country is so repugnant to me it makes me just want to rip off my own arm and beat someone with it. I really just do not understand the angle of those in power who are in charge of this. This is clearly an area which is important to the American people. Anyone who does something – anything to solve this problem will be a hero to the American people. Yet for some reason no one has enough spine here to do what is right and tell Vicente Fox to shove it. ARRRRRRRRGH

Here’s the link if you want to pull your hair out:

Washington Times: Border Patrol told to stand down in Arizona

I just realized I went an entire post without mentioning 24 or Star Wars. For your amusement, here’s a Polish billboard with Yoda on it (hat tip to TheForce.net):

TF.N: “Gwiezdne Wojny: Czesc III” Yoda Billboard

-MPAW

  

I found this article a couple days ago at WorldNetDaily about a group of church leaders condemning President Bush’s latest budget as “unjust” because it does not do enough to help the poor. They went so far as saying that economic injustice is “the gravest of all sins.” If you wish to read the news article before going on you can do so here:

WND: Mainline churches bash Bush budget

First of all, you can call George W. Bush many things, but a fiscal conservative is not one of them. Second, off the top of my head from my personal list of gravest sins, economic injustice is at least fourth after murder, rape, and listening to Clay Aiken. However, let’s assume for the sake of argument that these guys don’t have a political ax to grind and that hidden behind the somewhat hyperbolic rhetoric is a cause they are trying to advance for the greater good.

First let me say that I don’t think government social programs are moral or immoral from a religious perspective. The question is not should we be helping out the poor or not. Clearly we should be. The real question is, what is the best way to help the poor? Conservatives are stuck being labelled as uncompassionate because we do not believe the government is the most efficient charity organization in the world. Christian Conservatives are labelled as hypocrites because liberals think that a resistance to government programs is contrary to the teachings of Christ. I knew a teacher at Penn State who voted for Algore in 2000 because she believed that programs such as welfare were more in tune with the teachings of Christ. Fair enough.

However, I think the picture becomes crystal clear when you take both lines of thought to the most extreme. On one hand you would have a government that took every penny you earned and distributed it equally among its citizens (i.e. Marxism). On the other hand you could have a government that took no money earned by its citizens and there would be no welfare, food stamps, Social Security or Medicare. What you would have instead is a population that is a) more able to provide its own needs and b) have more money to give to charitable organizations (not to mention the freedom to choose where the money went). What’s more, you would be able to hold those charities accountable. (Incidentally, I don’t actually endorse either scenario, I was just using it as an example to point out the lesser of the two evils).

As for the religious aspect of this argument, I think the coerced confiscation of money to help the poor actually undermines Jesus’ teachings. Clearly it is right to give to charity and wrong to treasure your money above all else but all virtue in the act has it’s basis on the fact that we have that choice. You can go your entire life paying all your taxes but that doesn’t make you a charitable person. It just means you want to stay out of jail.

I don’t have an ultimate solution to this (nor does anyone). We will always have poverty no matter what system we have. I think ideally it would be best to shift the bulk of social programs into private organizations with state programs taking over from the federal government. What do I know though? Anyway, here’s this whole, long post in a nutshell:

1. The federal government is absolutely the least efficient body to run a charity.
2. Charity is a religious mandate only for an individual.

And I’m spent. . .

-MPAW

  

It was announced today that Spain’s Islamic Commission will issue a fatwa against Osama bin Laden today. They also called on Muslims to denounce terrorism as the one year anniversary of the 3/11 Madrid attacks is observed tomorrow. This is of course an appreciated gesture from a country unwilling to sacrifice to do anything that would actually hinder terrorism in any practical way. Not to mention the fact that this condemnation of terrorism comes 364 days after the Madrid attacks, three and a half years after September 11, 2001, and 12 years after the first World Trade Center attack (with more than a handful of attacks in between). Take your time guys. So if we can only get Spain to censure Zarqawi we should have this War on Terror thing about wrapped up. Thanks Spain.
-MPAW

Yahoo UK/IE: Spanish Muslims issue fatwa against Al-Qaeda’s Osama Bin Laden

PS - I just noticed the headline: “Al-Qaeda’s Osama bin Laden.” Thanks for the clarification. I was thinking it was Branson, Missouri’s Osama bin Laden.

  

Have you guys been following the Christopher Pittman trial? That’s rhetorical and it doesn’t matter because I haven’t either. Anyway, here’s the story: this kid murdered his grandparents, burned their house to the ground, and drove off in their car. Nice, right? The defense is blaming it on Zoloft saying that the drug caused him to be “involuntarily intoxicated” while committing the crimes.

Now, I’m no expert in the realm of Zoloft or it’s side effects so maybe the defense has a point here, but the quote that got my attention is this one:

Defense attorney Andy Vickery argued in the sentencing motion that trying Pittman as an adult violated the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. “How then can a civilized society assess the same culpability for, and impose the same punishment on, a 12-year-old as you would impose on a grown man?”

I for one am a little tired of people trying to conjur up sympathy for murderers just because they are less than 18 years old. If you have made it to the first grade, you know that killing another human being is wrong. You certainly know it by the time you are in 7th grade (which I assume is the grade Pittman was in since he was 12 years old when he did it). In fact, I would bet that the vast majority of 12 year olds who aren’t on trial for murder would be insulted if you asked them if they knew that murder was wrong. It’s amazing how often perceived compassion and sensitivity is really just insulting and demeaning.

As I said before, the “involuntarily intoxicated” defense might be legitimate (certainly questionable though because last I checked we don’t have an epidemic of Zoloft murders. In fact this is the only case I’ve heard of), but stop trying to make people feel sorry for the kid because of his age. We mourn when bad things happen to children moreso than adults because children are perceived to be more innocent and the least deserving of an ill fate. Guess what? When you kill your own grandparents and set fire to their houses because you are angry that they punished you for “choking a younger student on a school bus,” you are no longer innocent. At some point every child should learn that there are consequences for your actions and it seems Christopher Pittman learned too late.
-MPAW

Read about it here:

FNC: Zoloft Defense Teen Appeals Sentence

  

Since I wrote so much in the comments section of the cutting/emo post and since I’m not sure how many of you read it, I decided to post it on the main page:

Original Comment by John:

Wow, disagreeing on Mike’s blog, I really never thought the day would come. Got a few comments, first off which is worse: making a stupid post (as you claim Malkin did), or wasting all the space on your first blog in a week on telling someone they made a stupid post. You don’t even discuss the issue (a rare thing here on the Mike blog), you just make criticize her for not being as up to speed on culture as you. I have to admit this isn’t a topic I am terribly interested in, and it seems you agree, so why take the time to even bring it up then? Lastly, I’ve read Malkin’s book “Invasion” and it was an excellent read, maybe you should try it out before making a judgement purely on 90 second TV spots. Hope there’s no love lost, later.

My response:

Gordo: No love lost bro, BUT DON’T YOU EVER RAISE YOUR VOICE TO ME AGAIN!! Haha. Kidding. First off, this is not the first time you disagreed with me because you took me to task for excluding Shrek 2 on my favorite movies list from last year (which I have since seen and was impressed with).

With respect to your comments, your criticism of not addressing the core issue has some merit. As you mentioned, the issue of cutting is not my top interest, but I did comment on the aspects of it that interested me – namely, mischaracterizing emo and my past experiences with people who craved my attention for whatever reason. I actually didn’t address either to the extent I wanted to because I was at work so it was a bit of a rush job. Perhaps I will expound some more later tonight on the main page.

I confess to not having read any of Malkin’s books, so my impressions of her are not based on her entire body of work. My point is that I have seen her on TV for more than 90 seconds, and she is generally not that impressive. I don’t think she is a dullard. It could just be that verbal debate isn’t her thing (it’s not my favorite forum either). She often argues a position I share but in a way that either makes it the least convincing or in a way which I flat out disagree with (in this instance, I obviously agree that cutting is bad, but I certainly don’t think that Taking Back Sunday and Christina Ricci are the root cause of it).

I probably would have ignored it if it were an isolated incident. I probably would have ignored it if was just a post and not a syndicated column (God knows I’ve made my share of stupid posts here). In honesty, I would have even ignored it if it was written by a liberal. I wrote it because Michelle Malkin is a fairly recognizable figure in the Conservative movement and making mischaracterizing statements like the emo comment is embarassing. Be honest, would you be taking issue with this if I were criticizing Al Franken for making a similar comment?

Finally, if making a post about a stupid post is worse than the stupid post itself, where would commenting on a stupid post about a stupid post rank? Hmmmmmm.

  

You know, I really want to like Michelle Malkin but the most affectionate term I can come up with in association with her is “sympathy.” Everytime I see her on TV she’s usually espousing a position I agree with, but she always just seems out of her league. Today she has a piece on self-mutilation which she refers to as a “new craze.” Quite hip that Michelle Malkin. She even manages to connect emo music to cutting. Umm, yeah. She obviously doesn’t know what she’s talking about, but here’s the quote:

There is even a new genre of music—“emo”—associated with promoting the cutting culture.
-MichelleMalkin.com

This sort of mischaracterization I would find understandable from an old-time Conservative like say, Bill Buckley or Fred Barnes, but Malkin is young enough to know that neither cutting nor emo is new (nor have I ever heard an emo song that explicitly promotes cutting yourself). This is exactly the kind of comment that will send the Focus on the Family crowd irrationally throwing out their kid’s Jimmy Eat World albums. I’m not sure why this comment irritated me so much, although it reminds me of a video I had to watch in high school called “Highway to Hell” which discussed why rock music was the root of all evil in American society (a movie as ideal for MST3K as anything I’ve ever seen).

Speaking of cutting, that activity elicits absolutely no sympathy from me. I’m probably just callous at this point, but when I was a teenager I got sick of people telling me they cut or used to cut themselves. If this came up in conversation, it always came up within the first couple of conversations after meeting a person.

Perhaps if someone is cutting themselves in private and not telling anyone, then I feel some sympathy for them because they probably have some serious problems, but when you go around telling people that you do it, then you’re just looking for attention. Guess what? You won’t get it from me. Especially since in most cases when this happened I barely knew the person. If you truly realize you have a problem with something and need to confide in someone then you aren’t gonna tell a person you just met. So that’s why I’m an insensitive jerk about this particular topic – I associate it with a bunch of insecure, disingenuous teenagers from high school.
-MPAW

UPDATE: In case you missed it in the comments, Mike F shares my antipathy towards the cutters.

  

I was reading a post over at Anthony’s Blog addressing the reverse sexism of Madison Avenue. All in all, it’s pretty freakin’ good to be a white male in this country so I can’t really complain but these commercials that constantly portray men as bumbling buffoons only get to me because of all the whiners out there complaining about being offended about one thing or another. I think I can honestly say that these commercials would simply roll off my back without a second thought if we weren’t expected to laugh along with the joke while every other demographic has a collective heart attack every time they’re portrayed negatively. Not EVERYBODY can be portrayed in a positive light in the media for crying out loud. TV wouldn’t be entertaining if there weren’t any bad guys or punchlines (there are very few of the latter these days as is).

The prime example of this is these morons at CAIR who are complaining that terrorists are being portrayed on 24 as (gasp!) Muslims. This might be legitimate if the bad guys in the past three seasons weren’t from Bosnia, Germany, America, Mexico, and Great Britain. For crying out loud they’re upset because after four seasons the terrorists are actually being portrayed as being from the same general region as most of the terrorist in the world. OK, if you want to argue about the likelihood of a terrorist faction being from secular Turkey as opposed to fundamentalist Syria then go ahead, but CAIR (the Council on American-Islamic Relations) would be upset no matter what country the terrorists were from. Hey guys, if you don’t want to be portrayed as terrorists, STOP BLOWING YOURSELVES UP TO KILL AMERICANS AND JEWS! Somebody has to be the bad guy and frankly it’s more realistic to have a Muslim be responsible for kidnapping the Secretary of Defense than the Japanese or Canadians.

I guess my main point is that everyone needs to stop being so sensitive. I watch 24 religiously and I realize that despite a couple terrorists here and there not every Bosnian, German, American, Mexican, Brit, and Turk is a terrorist. Somebody has to be the bad guy. Somebody has to be the punchline. If the Muslims get PSAs during every episode of 24, white men have a legitimate right to have PSA saying we’re capable of doing laundry and cooking after about 75% of commericals out there. Why don’t we demand that? Because it would be ridiculous. So everybody just shut up, eat your ice cream and learn to laugh at yourself with us. Gosh.
-MPAW

  

Am I the only one who’s bothered by actors/actresses who use paper towels to dry their hands but obviously do not have wet hands to begin with? It seems like it would be a pretty cheap effect to achieve and it would “maintain the illusion” if I may borrow from Spidey 2.
-MPAW

  

I’d like to take a break from the fluff for a little bit (I have a few more “Favorites” lists to put up here in the next couple days but with the new Congress being sworn in, confirmation hearings being held and Inauguration right around the corner I’m going to be coming back from my post-election political commentary hiatus in the very near future).

Thomas Sowell has an excellent article (tip o’ the hat to Jay Nordlinger) on the media and how they are covering the Iraq War (and this is a tangent, but I actually read a New York Times article the other day about the season premiere of 24 that somehow managed to take shots at President Bush and the War in Iraq. Leave it to the Times. Amazing). His basic premise can be summarized by this excerpt:

In recent years, Vietnam’s Communist leaders themselves have admitted that they lost that war on the ground but hung on because the American anti-war movement gave them hope that they could win it politically. It was a well-founded hope that the American media helped make come true when we withdrew both our troops and our financial and political backing for the Vietnamese under attack.

At that time, the media had not yet come up with the gimmick of “honoring” American war dead but they nevertheless were able to throw away the victory for which those men sacrificed their lives.

Will they repeat that heady achievement a second time in Iraq? They certainly seem to be trying. And it is no honor.

Basically, he’s saying that the media is pretending to support the troops by focusing on their sacrifice, but they never ever do any stories of heroism or what is being accomplished. You can’t name one.

This really gives an interesting insight of the liberal mindset right now. They would literally rather portray their country as losers than be wrong about the war. I doubt that it’s a conscious action, but it’s hard to argue that the media is not hurting our cause.

Again, contrasting the liberal and the conservative mindset. When Clinton sent troops into Bosnia to overthrow a genocidal dictator (sound familiar?) without UN or Congressional approval, there was literally NO ONE on the right actually pulling for the defeat of our troops. At no point has conservative hatred of an American political opponent overwhelmed conservative love of country. No one on the right called Slobodan Milosevic a “minuteman” as Michael Moore has of the “insurgency” (read: terrorist scum) in Iraq. I feel that I have a pretty good understanding of the “reasoning” behind liberal thinking, but something like this I simply do not, and never will, understand.
-MPAW

  

I gotta say I’m a little surprised at the way the final climactic showdown between the Red Sox and Yankees went down, but nevertheless, Boston at long last got the better of New York. For the first time in baseball history and for only the third time in all the history of sports a team came back and won a seven game series after dropping the first three games. I can’t say that I thought it would go down like this, but as I mentioned in my post last night I had always suspected that if the Curse of the Bambino were to ever die, it would happen something like this.



The funny thing about the Curse is that there is no logical reason for me to believe in it and yet I do. It’s blind faith, I know, but deep in my being I believe in it although nothing supports that belief besides the course of history over the past 85 years.



Is the Curse dead now? I don’t think we can conclusively say until we see what happens in the World Series, but I think you can make a good case that the Curse is now broken. Just as significant as the fact that the Red Sox just completed the greatest post-season comeback in baseball history, is the fact that the Yankees just completed the greatest post-season collapse in baseball history. The roles of the two teams for the past 85 years have just reversed in the span of 4 days. I’m not ready to say that this marks the beginning of an 85 year championship drought for the Yankees and an era of dominance for the Red Sox, (as sweet as that would be) but I’ll settle for Steinbrenner to go back to his old ways and start meddling again in the off season.



So now I’m rooting for the Red Sox to win it all this year no matter who wins the NLCS. I had been pulling for the Cards in the NL, but now I think it would be more appropriate for Houston to win. Not only would the Sox have to confront another ghost from their past (Clemens), but it would be another clash this year between Massachusetts and Texas (in the important one, I’m pulling for Team Texas of course ).



Of course, if the Red Sox do indeed win the World Series this year, they will become just another team and basically a mini-Evil Empire themselves, so they should enjoy the love of the nation while they can because I’ll be hating them just as much as the Yankees in the years to come should their championship drought end this year. They are, essentially, everything that they’ve come to hate about the Yankees – sans the championships.

-MPAW

  

About a year ago last year I posted about why I love baseball and why I love to hate the New York Yankees (in which I honestly say why I’m so bitter towards the Yanks). Season after disappointing Orioles season I come back to baseball in October and I marvel about how much I love the sport over all others and game 6 tonight of the ALCS was no exception.



Wow, tonight was the first time I’ve ever seen a Yankees-Red Sox series where it was the Yankees that looked afraid and getting ready to choke. Even the fans seemed hesitant and unconfident (of course the riot gear-clad police kinda calmed them down). Of course that little pussy Alex Rodriguez slapping Bronson Arroyo like a little female dog almost seemed like a sign of their desperation.



[TRAIN OF THOUGHT DISTRACTION] The alien inside the sagging head of Peter Gammons can hardly contain his glee right now on SportsCenter. All of New England I’m sure is in a euphoria. [TRAIN OF THOUGHT BACK ON TRACK]



After the Sox went down 0-3 to the Yankees I said to several friends, “You know, I’m sure the curse will impose itself at some point, but if the Red Sox ever broke it, was there any doubt that it would go something like this? Something epic and unbelievable?” That being said, I learned last year not to ever bet against the curse (I actually ended up cleaning out a lot of pubes from the bathtub from losing that bet), and of course I will still be crushed when what I totally expect to happen, does in fact happen.



In fact, I expect the earth to be swallowed by a black hole right as the final out is made if the Red Sox do actually win tomorrow. Tomorrow could be a monumental moment not only in baseball history, but in human history. . . or history will continue as it always has and the Yankees will win and nuclear war will be averted.



History was made tonight with the BoSox becoming the first baseball team ever to tie up a best-of-seven series after going down 0 – 3, and I expect tomorrow’s game to last 15 hours and for the hearts of all Red Sox fans to be crushed.

-MPAW



PS – WHERE THE EFF WAS THIS UMPIRING CREW IN 1996???? Seriously, the Yanks get BS calls in their favor every year and this is the first time that the crew ever huddled to get things right.



[ANOTHER TRAIN OF THOUGHT BREAK] Curt Schilling just said, “I’m so f&cking proud to be on this team,” about a half hour after giving his testimony to the Fox Sport correspondent. Doesn’t really bother me, but it will bother a lot of fundamentalists. [END TOT BREAK]



Yeah, so if the umpires had actually huddled to get things right in 1996, then maybe the Orioles would have won that ALCS instead of dropping game 1 thanks to the interfering hand of a fat 13 year old (who was rewarded for breaking the rules by becoming a celebrity in NY and appearing on Opera by the way), then the Yankees don’t win the World Series that year, then George Steinbrenner fires Torre and Cashman and the Yankee mini-dynasty never happened. Ugh. In some parallel universe the Orioles just beat the Yankees in the ALCS to defend their ninth consecutive world championship.

  

There are two things today I found out about/thought about that really pissed me off about this campaign. First of all, there are a shocking number of ignorant people out there my age who really think that Bush is going to re-instate the draft when he gets re-elected.



First of all, there is absolutely no credible evidence to support the claims that the President is considering this. I would expect more out of a better man, but this is just continuing evidence that Kerry will throw any mud just hoping some of it will reach its target. Second, the President has said repeatedly in public that he will not reinstate the draft. Finally, there WAS a bill proposed in Congress to reinstate the draft. It was proposed by Democratic Representative Charlie Rangle. It was brought up for a vote yesterday by the GOP to make a point (and was voted down by all but 2 votes). Even Representative Rangle voted against HIS OWN BILL.



The fact that so many young people believe this simply because Kerry and friends repeat it constantly and are TOO LAZY TO SIMPLY LOOK UP THE FACT THAT THE ONLY PERSON PROPOSING REINSTATING THE DRAFT IS A DEMOCRAT enrages me. This is why I’m leary about these turn out the vote programs. Large voter turn out is great if they’re actually educated and these people simply are not.



Honestly, this probably would not have me in a bad mood if I hadn’t been hearing about the news of little Democratic punks commiting acts of violence against Republicans. The Kerry Spot tells of no less than 5 acts of violence in Maryland, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Minnesota. The Drudge Report has more stories of violence out of Milwaukee and Orlando.



Frankly, the tactics of the Democratic party are becoming more and more like the Taliban. The only difference is that the Democrats are sticking to guns and chain saws instead of car bombs (so far). Stealing yard signs is one thing, but when one side repeatedly is burning swatikas in front yards, storming campaign headquarters, using chain saws to vandalize Bush signs and FIRING SHOT GUNS at Republican Headquarters things are getting out of hand. I’m afraid of what will happen when the President is re-elected in this country because the fringe of the Democratic party has gone wacky with hatred.



A Kerry victory would not produce the same results from the Republicans and if it did, we would be the first in condemning them. Some of these are by stupid punk teenagers, but some are not and what’s more I don’t hear a peep out of the Democratic side calling on their followers to cut this crap out. I’m sick of them spewing their hypocritical BS rhetoric of tolerance and compassion while stoking the fires of their radical liberal followers. I’m gonna go watch some baseball now because I’m really just sick of this crap and being paranoid about parking my car outside with a Bush bumper sticker. I hope you liberals are proud of yourselves.



Stories of Violence/Vandalism:

PRO-KERRY FORCES INVADE GOP VICTORY CENTER

Protestors Ransack Bush/Cheney Headquarters In Orlando: Two Injured

Republican campaign signs vandalized

Couple charged with destroying signs

Teens confess to vandalizing campaign signs

Teen, angry over brother’s deployment, steals 71 Bush signs

Shot fired at GOP Headquarters in Huntington

Shots fired at Bush Tenn. headquarters

  

Well, it’s been a while since I’ve posted and I’ll tell you why – I’M SICK OF VIETNAM! PLEEEEEEEEEEEEASE STOP TALKING ABOUT VIETNAM! And for that matter, I’m sick of the SeeBS Memogate scandal and anything else that happened back in the `70s. WHY ARE WE TALKING ABOUT THIS. PLEASE TALK ABOUT IRAQ, THE ECONOMY, GAY MARRIAGE, THE WAR ON TERROR, OVERHAULING THE TAX CODE, HEALTHCARE, JANET JACKSON’S BOOBY, OR THAT GREEDO DIDN’T SHOOT FIRST. . . I DON’T CARE WHAT YOU TALK ABOUT AS LONG AS IT’S HAPPENING IN THIS DECADE!! (Of course, technically Han shot first in the `70’s, but you get my drift).



Sorry, I’m usually a bit more controlled than this and please interpret all caps as me screaming because this campaign has become as boring as I feared from the day Kerry won the nomination. Am I the only one that misses Howard Dean? Yeeeeeeeeeahhhhhhh!



OK, so a brief word about SeeBS. You would think that I would be eager to talk about it with so many people saying that it officially marked the beginning of the era of the New Media. Since I myself have a blog, I will of course be a proponent of such a development. Of course, we will always have the mainsteam (read: partisan) media such as SeeBS, but they’ve been in decline for over a decade now.



The first Iraq war brought in CNN (which of course was just as bad), but the Old Media really died the day Fox News came into being. That and the development of the internet has shaped our world policially more than the Old Media will dare admit. It’s important to step back a second here and ponder what actually happened in the past two weeks: SeeBS aired forged documents just a month and a half before an election to try and bring down the incumbent President. Just as astounding as their displayed hubris is the fact that they would have gotten away with it if the public’s information was still monopolized by the big three networks. Now, they can’t get away with it, and that’s a good thing.



Here’s looking forward to the debates next week. Dick Morris says it will be the death knell of Kerry, but in reality it presents a much greater risk to Bush since it presents his last major chance to self-destruct. That being said, Dubya has beaten every one of his opponents in the debate forum and I expect nothing less next Thursday. 39 days till Election Day. . .

-MPAW

  

If you turned on any random news station yesterday or today, you noticed that the Senate has been having 9/11 hearings. Among those called to testify were Clinton Secretary of State Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of Defense Bill Cohen, Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld, CIA Head George Tenet, and of course the man of the hour – Dick Clarke (not American Bandstand Dick Clark, Clinton “Terror Czar” Dick Clarke).



Clarke of course has been in the news of late due to his criticism of Bush “not taking terrorism seriously” in the 8 months he was actually President before September 11, 2001 while praising all that Clinton did in the eight years prior to that. Clarke even stated today that there was no priority greater in the Clinton White House than stopping terrorism (of course he did not mention anything about Clinton’s reluctance to kill bin Laden and even passed up bin Laden’s head on a platter as a gift from Sudan).



The mainstream media is too busy in mid-orgasm over Clarke’s accusations to question why Clarke had previously praised President Bush (transcript) for everything he has done in the War on Terrorism. Nor do they wonder that perhaps he is just another Clinton leftover that is trying to justify the fact that the Clinton administration did nothing to fight terrorism during their tenure. The War on Terror did not begin on September 11, 2001. That is simply when the battle was joined. So what did Clinton do after the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center? How about after the 1996 Olympic bombing (which we still do not have a real culprit for)? How about after our embassies were bombed? How about after TWA flight 800 (which could very well have been a covered up attack before the 1996 election)? How about after the USS Cole was bombed?



The terror war has been going on since the 70’s, we are responding for the first time since the Reagan administration, and it is BUSH who did not do enough in his first EIGHT MONTHS IN OFFICE??? How about your eight YEARS advising President Clinton, Mr Clarke? Did you advise the President to continuously cut the budget for our armed forces and intelligence agencies or was that just President Clinton’s idea? Leslie Stahl may not have the intestinal fortitude to ask you these questions, but the average American is connecting the dots behind your motivations (incidentally, SeeBS again crossed the line – this time in cross promotion, but that’s for another post).



For the record, my position on casting blame for the attacks of September 11 is exactly what it was on September 12, 2001. It isn’t President Bush’s fault. It isn’t President Clinton’s fault. It is the fault of the terrorists themselves. Of course others could have done more to prevent those attacks, but through all the political maneuvering going on right now, never forget that it is the TERRORISTS who crashed the planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, not President Bush. In fact he is the only one since Reagan who has actually fought back against terrorism. Never forget on whom the REAL blame lies and which side should be eradicated.

-MPAW

  

OK, so I just have a never ending river of ideas constantly flowing through my brain on this issue because a) it’s in the headlines every day and b) it seems somehow interconnected to everything wrong with this country (namely, liberalism. Yes, I know that’s broad and I thought about it and I mean it). Anyway, I was bombarded on both fronts after I posted the first time on gay marriage in an all out Heller assault with this article:



Crosswalk: The End of Marriage in Scandinavia: Is America Next?



It’s a good read, although I certainly don’t think that American morality will ever get to the point of Scananavian morality. I have a lot of faith in the American people – possibly too much. I believe that most Americans secretly yearn for a Norman Rockwell America and a return to traditional values. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: the American people will ignore an issue for a long time until it seems that something they hold dear is being threatened. A flash point will be reached when it comes to morality in America or a generation will rise and correct what has been done before. It’s happened before and it will happen again and whether it is gay marriage or Janet Jackson showing both breasts, something will trigger a counter-counter culture and reverse the `60’s.



Another good read posted in the comment section was Anthony’s blog. It pretty much says everything that I said in my post below . . . except he beat me by about 2 months .



As I said in my first post, I don’t know where this road will eventually lead us with gay marriage. I don’t know what the ultimate solution is. However, I have been pondering temporary solutions. Governor Schwarzenegger is already ordering an end to the anarchy in SF through the state attorney general (so much for Arnold being a social liberal. So far he’s had significantly testicular fortitude that I had anticipated). I don’t know how California’s government is structured, but federally the executive branch’s responsibility is to make sure laws are executed (thus the “Executive” branch!) and can utilize the much-abused power of the executive order to do so. I’m not sure if Arnold a) can make an executive order or b) if the city of San Francisco will even recognize such an order.



Further, the state of Califonia should take actions to remove the mayor of San Francisco from office for ignoring state law and the will of the people of California. Again, I have no idea what actions can be taken in this respect but there has to be an avenue to hold this man responsible. I seriously doubt citizens of San Francisco will be moving for a recall, but who knows. The state as a whole is known as being far out and liberal and yet 60%+ voted to keep marriage defined as between a man and a woman and almost 60% voted in rebellion of Gray Davis and in favor of a Republican. I literally think I could keep typing my thoughts on this matter forever, but I’m gonna leave it here even though I just remembered I didn’t even write one of the main things I wanted to talk about. I’ll save it for tomorrow. Cheers ya’ll

-MPAW