Iran Goes Apeshit

It's refreshing that they haven't been burning Old Glory and screaming "Death to America!" Whatever happens, you can be sure Rush Limbaugh will blame it on President Obama.

Getty Image from Huffington Post.

From The "No Shit Sherlock" And 'I'm Scared" Files

Mohamed ElBaradei, chief of the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency, says Iran may be hiding secret nuclear activities.

Ya think?

Compounding the scariness is a military parade that Iran held over the weekend featuring trucks with large banners on the side that read, "Israel must be eliminated from the universe" and "Down with the USA" in English and Farsi.

Can you say "World War Three"?

Reading Roundup

I've been cutting back on the amount of political news I'm ingesting. Frankly, I've already made up my mind, and there really isn't anything that Muttley/Beaverhausen can say to sway my vote away from Obama/Biden.

However, despite my serious efforts, I can't get away from the news completely because I'm a current affairs junkie. I always tear out the pages of periodicals or print out web pages and then circle the critical points to emphasize their importance. The clippings then sit on my desk and I end up trashing them as the news cycle moves on to the next topics.

I'm clearing off my desk, and here's what I've found that's still worth mentioning.

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From Newsweek magazine's Letters column, September 22, 2008 issue:

"I couldn't believe that Anastasia Beaverhausen Sara Palin ridiculed Barack Obama's years of work as community organizer during her convention speech. The suffragists who earned Palin the right to vote were community organizers. So were the feminists who agitated to improve job opportunities for women and made it possible for Beaverhausen Palin to play high-school basketball. Abolitionists who fought against slavery, workers on the underground railroad guiding slaves to freedom and civil-right workers were community organizers. So are union organizers who help improve the lives of workers. Finally, we owe the very existence of our country to a dedicated group of community organizers, more commonly know as our Founding Fathers.

— Jane Cameron, Piscataway, NJ

Eight years ago the GOP noimated a short-term governor of a large, oil-rich state to be president. They described him as a regular guy and said his lack of international experience wouldn't be a problem Now it has nominated a short-term governor of a large, oil-rich state to be vice president and see no problem with her inexperience. For me once, shame on you. Fool me twice...

— Hilton Weiss, Rhinebeck, NY

You can always count on interesting perspectives and getting a feel for where the country is at by reading the letters to the editor.

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From Newsweek magazine's Perspectives column, September 22, 2008 issue:

"Until...the news media is going to treat her with some level of respect and deference...it would be foolhardy to put her out into that kind of environment."

— McCain campaign manager Rick Davis, on why vice presidential candidate Anastasia Beaverhausen Sara Palin is giving so few interviews to the press

She's going to be one heart beat away from being president. Gee, if she can't handle the U.S. press corps, how is she going to handle our relationships with Putin, Ahmadinejad, and Chavez. They aren't going to show up to the White House bearing candy, roses, and a Miss Universe sash.

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From Time magazine's Verbatim column, September 29, 2008 issue:

"Maybe he thought he was going to have a more folksy ride."

— Barbara Walters, cohost of The View, after Cindy McCain accused the show of attacking her husband during an appearance.

See my comments on the Beaverhausen clip above Ditto here.

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Now my desktop is ready for next week!

Oil Prices Plummet

Oil plunged $5 as investors fled to safer havens due to turmoil in the U.S. financial system and on early signs Hurricane Ike had spared key U.S. energy infrastructure. London Brent crude fell $5.26 to $92.32 a barrel.

High fuel prices and wider economic problems have dragged down oil demand in the U.S. and other large consumer nations, sending crude prices from a record high over $147 a barrel in July.

Some thoughts:

• Fuck you Chavez, Ahmadinejad, and Putin (less leverage for the hostage takers)
• Fuck you Muttley/Beaverhausen...drilling is not the key to price drops (ummm, it's about our exploding debt and the weak dollar but don't let the facts get in your way)
• Fuck you to the speculators...I hope you go bankrupt (without a taxpayer bailout)
• This is good news for the poor people that need to heat their homes this winter
• This is bad news because it shows the extreme fucked-up-ness of our economy

Other than the effects on the economy and country in a macro sense, the price of oil effects me not. I won't benefit from this as I didn't feel the pinch when prices skyrocketed.

Douche Bag Of The Week: Short And Smelly

Today's Douche Bag of the Week award goes to Iran's short and smelly President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. This asshole wants permission to lay a wreath at the site of the WTC while he's here addressing the U.N. next week. [If you aren't up for a right-wingish rant, you might want to skip this post.]

No doubt he'll be bashing America and Israel, and buying time to get a nuclear bomb. Ummm, if it weren't for his support of the killers and their ilk, the events on 9/11 may not have happened. Doesn't he get it? Of course he does, 'cause he's all about creating controversy and trying to make Americans look bad. I mean, this is high school level manipulation and lying. I suppose that's fine if you're so fucking backed-up in your thinking, but hell no he wants to do it on the grave of our fallen innocents. Go home and torture some more political opponents and leave us alone.

I have a brilliant idea. I say we detain his sorry ass and "interrogate" him just like the Iranian government did to Iranian-Americans that were recently visiting Iran. How could he complain? It's the policy of his very government that thinks this behavior is permissible.

Quite frankly, I'm old enough to remember the hostage standoff from '79-'80 where Americans were held by Islamic revolutionaries for two years. For those of you too young, did you realize the late-night television news show Nightline started as a daily recap of what was happening on that story? It is reported that Ahmadinejad was one of the people that took part in the kidnappings. Hardly a surprise then that Iran has a government policy of doing it now, is it?

I wouldn't consider myself a warmonger, but I'm no peacenik either. I wish we'd have bombed the bastards back then. I love Jimmy Carter, but I think it is one of the most serious mistakes he made while in office. He should have taken out Ayatollah Kackamemmi and his fascists when he had the chance.

Short and smelly is my Douche Bag of the Week.
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Sorry, Mr. Holocaust Denier

Good ol' Short 'n' Smelly (Iranian President Ahmadinejad) insisted on Saturday that 15 captured British sailors had been seized in Iranian waters, calling Britain and its allies "arrogant" for refusing to apologize. Ummmm, we're expected to believe someone who denies the Holocaust? Even if he's right about where the Brits were found, his credibility is shot.
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Ahmadinejad: Little Superstar

Short and smelly, aka Iranian President Ahmadinejad, is seen here celebrating the capture of British armed forces as the Revolutionary Guard plays an early April Fool's prank on him by stopping and starting the boom box. His mother eventually shoos them all out the door — ostensibly to hang some gay people in a public square, to prepare some EFPs for export to Iraq, or to enrich uranium.

Iran claims the Brits were in Iranian waters, the Brits say they weren't and claim to have GPS satellite info to corroborate their story. Apparently this border area has a long history of dispute. I bet those captured wish that the Bush administration hadn't decided to only observe those parts of the Geneva Conventions that suit the captors not the captees.
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Short 'n Smelly's On Another Screed

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad threatened any country that supports Israel, and said the U.S. and its allies had "imposed a group of terrorists" on the region with their support of the Jewish state.

Ahmadinejad said the U.N. Security Council, getting ready to decide a course of action on Iranian nukes, and its decisions would be "illegitimate" as long as it was dominated by the U.S. and Britain. He doesn't seem to think that when Russia and/or China don't agree and threaten to veto U.S. resolutions as a balance of power. And certainly he and his twin in Venezuela didn't have any problem using the podium at the U.N. to spout their radical idiocy when they were in New York City last month.

He still hasn't answered one fundamental question: If you're sitting on the fourth largest oil reserves in the world, why do you need nuclear power?