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                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     JASON SMITH

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THE DAILY DIATRIBE  for Tuesday, April 18th  (click here for the RSS feed!) 

 

 

HAPPY EASTER

JESUS!

 

And to thank you for dying for us, here's a chocolate rabbit and some colored eggs!

 

 

read it/ hear it

 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

MORE RECENT DIATRIBES                     

Steroids: Why parents, press and politicians should worry about REAL problems instead. (3-30-06) read it / hear it

Prostitution: tax it...don't ban it. (3-23-06) read it / hear it

Call a Spade a Spade: and a terrorist a terrorist, even if he speaks English and attended UNC. (3-14-06) read it / hear it

American Ports, Foreign Control: the truth behind the politics of port control. (3-1-06) read it / hear it

Boycott Gary Busey and Billy Zane! Learn why these two Americans are undermining American-Muslim relations. (2-22-06) read it / hear it

The Minutemen: NOT necessarily xenophobic...NOT necessarily racist. (2-15-06) read it / hear it

Pop Quiz: Local TV News is: a) gory   b) sensational   c) talent-less   d) irrelevant....answer E) all of the above!  (2-10-06) read it / hear it

Praise Allah I don't live in a Muslim Country!  Unfortunately Jihad Momani and Hisham Khalidi do.(2-7-06) read it / hear it

Surveillance Cameras: Threat to liberty, or powerful crime deterrent? (2-3-06) read it / hear it

Paint, Draw, or Sketch Islam's Muhammad at your Own Risk! But Jesus?  No Problem! (2-1-06) read it / hear it

Judicial Junkets: Threat to democracy, or no big deal?. (1-27-06) read it / hear it

Google vs. Bush: Weren't Republicans supposed to be the party of smaller government?. (1-23-06) read it / hear it

Al-Jazeera: Al Qaida's P.R. Firm. (1-20-06) read it / hear it

Crab: Why pay through the nose to eat something so flavorless and deadly to catch. (1-18-06) read it / hear it

TV's "The Insider": the fall of a once-decent entertainment show. (1-16-06) read it / hear it

Pit Bulls: Why trashy, lowlife dog-owners--NOT pit bulls--are the real problem.  (1-11-06) read it / hear it

The Golden Globes: Why no one should care about these worthless "awards."  (1-9-06) read it / hear it

The Death Penalty: How to Fix It.  (1-5-06) read it / hear it

The Death Penalty: Why it's Useless.  (12-16-05) read it / hear it

The Christian Right: Not Afraid of the Devil, but Gay Marriage...Now THAT'S Scary!!!  (12-9-05) read it / hear it

A Bowl Game for Every Team: Have Liberals Taken Over College Football? (12-7-05) read it / hear it

Memo to Liberal Scrooges: Make Like Frosty the Snowman and "Chill Out" on the Capitol X-mas Tree! (12-2-05) read it / hear it

Reality Shows: the most UN-realistic Shows on Television (11-25-05)  read it / hear it

Mugabe: Meet the Dictator who Wants to Take Control over Internet Addressing Away from the United States (11-16-2005) read it / hear it

                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

 

HAPPY RESURRECTION JESUS!  And to thank you for dying for us, here's a chocolate rabbit and some colored eggs!

 

Even if you don’t believe that Jesus Christ was the son of God, you can still be sure of two very important things: 1) that he lived approximately 2000 years ago; and 2) that he was a great man.  Sure, Jesus has always had people who claimed to follow him who he’d probably rather not have had his name or the name of Christianity (the religion named after him) associated with.  But claims of miracles aside, if he actually said the things he said and taught the things he taught about loving everyone including our enemies, turning the other cheek, and forgiveness of those who do bad things to us, that alone would certainly be worthy of a holiday.

 

And we all know that Jesus not only said and taught amazing things, he also did some pretty amazing things too, the most important of which (to his believers) was being tortured, then killed, then ultimately resurrected to atone for the sins of mankind in order to give eternal life in paradise to anyone that believes in him—regardless of their previous religion, race, or language they spoke.  This incredible man’s teachings—again, putting questions of his divinity aside, and much to the chagrin of modern-day liberals—are the foundation of enlightenment thinking, universal claims of human rights, and democracies like ours here in the United States of America.  In my book, that remarkable feat is worthy of another holiday.

 

And so it is that Jesus quite rightly gets not one but two prominent holidays in America—Christmas and Easter—one celebrating his birth and another celebrating his resurrection.  But what isn’t quite right is the way that those two days are celebrated by everyone—including his followers—and in this Easter season, I thought I’d share my thoughts about the dissing of Jesus.

 

When you think about it, even mortals like Martin Luther King Jr. and George Washington seem to get more respect on the days set aside to remember their lives and accomplishments than Jesus himself gets on the days set aside to remember his.  And what’s worse, while you rarely get an argument from anyone about paying public homage to Martin and George, you frequently hear people shying away from praising even Jesus the historical figure and Jesus the man for the important impact of his teachings on the modern world.  To do so is labeled “endorsement of Christianity” or “prejudicial” against other religions and atheists, and when it’s done by public officials, their words are usually slandered by the liberal left as being “unconstitutional.”  Pretty sad, because unlike George Washington Jesus never owned slaves, unlike Christopher Columbus he never conquered and subjected entire peoples (nor did he advocate the subjection of peoples), and even to some non-Christians, his achievements equaled if not surpassed those of the likes of Washington and Columbus.

 

And then there’s the ways people celebrate Jesus’ alleged death and resurrection.  While it’s true that some people do actually attend a church service on Easter (any for many of them this is the only time they attend a Christian house of worship), we all know that for most people, Easter is better known for the hams we eat at Easter dinner, the “Easter Bunny” who delivers eggs and chocolate rabbits to kids in Easter baskets, Easter sales at local and national retailers, and the coloring, hiding and hunting of hard-boiled eggs.  Forget about claims that the whole egg thing is pagan in its history…the problem for me is that these Easter customs have nothing to do with Jesus whatsoever, and in my book, Christians who mark the occasion of their savior’s resurrection with egg hunts, rabbits and candy should be embarrassed and ashamed.

 

Jesus is at the core of the religion of most Americans, he’s revered as a prophet of God by Muslims, and as I said earlier even Jews, Buddhists, atheists and agnostics with a clue know that his teachings are the foundation of core western ideals like freedom, democracy and universal human rights.  All I’m saying is this: maybe Jesus’ followers should consider celebrating his resurrection by doing something that Jesus would approve of; so this Easter, why not help the poor have a hot meal, instead of helping yourself to quite literally suck an egg?

 

 

STEROID BANS: Why Parents, Press and Politicians Should Worry About REAL Problems Instead.

 

In the past few months steroids have been in the press so much that you’d think they had their own publicists.  It’s either news that big-league record-holders like Mark McGuire or Jose Canseco have been “outed” as users, or another sob story featuring parents whining about their kid whose death has been linked to the illegal drugs.  Or maybe it’s a story about a shady doctor at a shady lab who’s providing supplements to athletes, or, maybe it’s my personal favorite kind of steroid story—a story about politicians at every level promising to ride in like the cavalry to rescue society from the evils of steroids and all other forms of illegal performance-enhancing drugs.  Any way you slice it you’d think steroids were the root of all evil on planet earth and that we should be thankful to have the press and our politicians paying so darned much attention to them.

 

Well, I beg to differ.

 

Let me ask you this…when was the last time you heard of someone being hurt by a steroid?  No, not someone you read about or heard about in the press but someone you actually know.  My guess is not many of you.  Let me ask you another question: when was the last time that the actions of professional baseball players on or off the field had a major impact on you or your child’s behavior?  My hunch, again, is not many of you.  One final question—and I really want you to think hard about this one and realize that I’m being very, very serious: what the hell difference does it make to you whether someone—anyone—uses steroids?  I’m not asking what bad things could happen to that person who uses the steroids…and remember, those potential bad things are happening only to that person—who, by the way, is also well aware of the possible side effects of using before they use.  I’m also not asking about bad things like “undeserved homerun records” or “undeserved state championships”…I’m talking about real bad things that happen to lots of people other than the people who use the drugs.  When you put it all in the proper perspective, steroids really don’t hurt anyone but the idiots dumb enough to use them in spite of the risks they’re already aware of before they use them.

 

In light of this epiphany, I’ve got some suggestions for everyone seemingly so concerned with steroids: the press, politicians, parents, and the public.  First the press: stick to real stories about real problems affecting a lot of people—not just the one or two morons who off themselves when they stupidly use these illegal drugs..  Cover the lack of preparedness for things like natural disasters, terror attacks and pandemics.  Cover corruption in public offices and major corporations.  Cover the economy, employment, inflation and investments.  But stop exploiting the deaths of a handful of fools from steroid use to sensationalize a problem that really isn’t a problem.

 

Next, politicians: worry about legislating the steroid problem away when you’ve managed to whittle congressional sessions down to two months so you can spend the rest of your year living in the states and districts you’re supposed to be representing.  Worry about the so-called steroid problem when you’ve eliminated overlapping government bureaucracies, increased governmental efficiency and reduced unnecessary spending.  In other words, do your jobs and solve real problems—stop the touchy-feely hearings and grandstanding.  And whatever you do, do not clutter the already cluttered law books with unnecessary steroid bans and punishments for the morons who violate them, and do not waste good public money on teaching kids of the evils of steroids—something best left to parents and teachers.

 

Annnd parents: parent!  Don’t forget about that beautiful verb derived from what you are—a parent.  Do your job and Billy and Daisy won’t ever think about using the juice.  The time you spend whining to Congress and state governments about steroid laws should be spent getting a clue what your kids are putting in their bodies and making sure it’s not ‘roids.

 

And finally, to the public: get off your moral high horse and stop looking down upon your heroes when they do something that your ridiculous worship of them encourages them to do in the first place.  The fans and the public made icons like Mark McGuire, Jason Giambi and Jose Canseco who they were.  Better yet, stop worshipping them and stop rewarding them with your dollars when you learn they’re cheating and breaking the law to do so if you’ve got such a problem with it.  That’s what hits their wallets, and God knows President Benjamin on a bill is more powerful than President Bush in the White House.  And let’s not forget, the evil steroid is already illegal when used by athletes in this way, so if you feel the need to morph into chicken little, then go run around demanding the enforcement of laws already on the books making the unprescribed use of performance-enhancing steroids illegal.

 

Look…I’m not trying to say that steroids are good or that their athletic, non-prescribed use should be legalized or even encouraged for that matter.  But on the whole, they’re not doing that much damage to that many people, and for the most part, their effects—good and bad—are limited to the user, who knows what he—or she—was getting into before they even started juicing.  In fact, in my book, the worst effect of steroids is that they make parents, the press, politicians and the public flip out unnecessarily.

 

Now if there were actually a way to legislate away “flipping out unnecessarily”—now that’s an additional governmental intrusion I might actually be able to get behind.

 

 

PROSTITUTION: Tax it, don’t ban it.

 

It’s called “the world’s oldest profession” for a reason.  And it’s not just New York City’s, the State of California’s or even America’s oldest profession; it’s the world’s oldest profession, which should tell us that it probably involves something about all human beings regardless of culture, religion or color.  And it’s not just the world’s oldest pastime, hobby, habit or fad; it’s the world’s oldest profession, which should tell us that for longer than anything else, it’s been something that humans do to make money.

 

But while turning tricks…whoring yourself out…having sex for cash…and for my hip-hop readers, “big pimpin’” may be so old that father time himself might have utilized the services of a woman of the night, prostitution, to this very day, and even in America—the so-called “land of the free”—is still quite illegal.  Yes, even though the world’s oldest profession continues to thrive in every American city (despite being illegal) either out in the open in the form of hoochie-mamas walkin’ street corners, or under the guise of the less threatening-sounding “escort services,” even though it essentially involves consenting adults engaging in activities that would be perfectly legal were it not for the fact that money was changing hands, and even though its illegal status means that it’s both un-regulated and that society earns no tax revenue from it…yes, it’s still illegal.

 

Is it just me, or were the first people in the United States to pass laws banning prostitution members of the Taliban?  Actually those laws probably are vestiges from a time when American laws looked a little more like Islamic sharia law than they should have, from the days when things like using the lord’s name in vain and adultery could get you a nice fat scarlet letter on your chest or a stint in the stocks, and when other non-crimes like witchcraft could get you burned at the stake.  But regardless of the reason why prostitution was first legally banned, there is just no good reason for such bans across America to continue today.

 

Look—just as I’m not a pot smoker but I still think there’s no compelling reason for it to be illegal, just as I’d never pay for a prostitute, there’s just no compelling reason for grown men and women engaging in otherwise legal behavior (with the minor addition of a mutually agreed-upon financial transaction) to be illegal either.  None.

 

But Jason!  Are you saying that you wouldn’t care if hookers walked the streets in broad daylight…hookers?!  Do you actually want there to be a whorehouse right next door to you?  Do you have any idea what that will do to the rate of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases?  These are usually the responses of those who are opposed to prostitution—often on religious grounds—but who at least try to frame their opposition in more practical terms because even they know that simply saying “because it’s a sin and it’s wrong” isn’t quite enough.

 

My first response to those more practical concerns is that yes, I would care about whether hookers walk the streets and it’s not necessarily my first choice of things to see as I drive down the road.  But with that in mind, there are plenty of other people that I’d also rather not see as I drive down the road but it doesn’t always mean that they should be illegal.  Poorly-dressed people, mimes and cigarette smokers are people I’d like to see removed from public sidewalks, but that doesn’t mean we need to legally ban them.  Also, it’s not like prostitutes tend to violently wield weapons at passers-by, hurl epithets, or even come across as threatening in the least.  In fact, as far as undesirables are concerned, they’re not doing anyone any harm, they tend to smile at you because of the nature of their work, and their manner of dress tends to be quite entertaining too!  Also, unlike other things which are legal, prostitution is not carcinogenic (like cigarettes) and does not lead to drunk driving, liver disease and alcoholism (like booze).  And as far as the transmission of STDs is concerned, empirical evidence from places like Amsterdam where it’s legal actually shows reductions in STD transmission rates.  And before someone tries to use a straw man argument that legalized prostitution will mean hookers parading in front of schools, churches and your house, don’t let them get away with it and make sure to remind them that if prostitutes were made legal, they’d be regulated.  So just as there’s not a bar next door to every church or a strip club next to every school, it’s not like we’re gonna be seeing hookers hookin’ down residential blocks, in apartment complexes or in malls.  That’s what zoning and regulation are for.  Finally, consider the financial tradeoff: knowing that a legalized prostitute’s hefty hourly earnings would no doubt be taxed significantly, imagine the potentially huge reductions in the tax burden for the rest of us.  Just think of the Nevada example when it comes to gambling.  Because gambling’s legal (yet another behavior many consider to be sinful), nobody in the state of Nevada pays a single penny in state income tax. 

 

And let’s not forget about the shame factor for hookers and their clients.  Just because something becomes legal it doesn’t mean that people are proud and public about doing it.  Buying porn, going to a nude beach and cross-dressing are also legal but that doesn’t mean you do those things in broad daylight in front of your grandparents and children.  A negative social stigma will almost certainly remain attached to either picking up or being a prostitute—even when it’s made legal.  So even without zoning and regulations which we’ll certainly also have, you can expect shame alone to keep women of the night out of the daylight.  And one last point about the shame factor.  Unless you live under a rock you know that rare practice of prostitution—whether done at a whorehouse or done under the stewardship of a street pimp—is constantly being glamorized in American media by shows like TV’s “The Insider” (who routinely profiles the exploits of New York’s most expensive call-girl) and the HBO series “Cathouse” (which follows the excitement at a legal Nevada brothel).  But with the widespread legalization of prostitution, perhaps it’ll help “deflower” its novelty, make it more cliché, and return some of the moral shame to the practice that the media’s glamorization of it has removed.

 

And I just want to mention one last contradiction regarding prostitution in society today.  With the exception of a few counties in Nevada, prostitution in America is by and large illegal.  However, almost anywhere in America it’s perfectly legal to shoot an X-rated movie, which is nothing more than prostitution caught on tape, and then sell that movie to adults in perfectly legal adult video stores.  So what’s the contradiction?  The contradiction is that our foolish laws are telling the public, “it’s only legal to be a prostitute if you’re going to make your sexual exploits public and make money making them public, but if you’re going to keep your prostitution a private matter between you and your john, well….then we’ve got a problem!”  It just makes no sense whatsoever.  If it’s legal to film it and sell it, then it should be legal if you don’t film it and make it public either.

 

Remember what I said back at the beginning of today’s diatribe: prostitution is the world’s oldest profession…and it’s gonna continue to thrive even if it’s illegal.  So the question isn’t whether or not to get rid of it; the question is whether or not we want to rein in and regulate this non-crime, and tax the heck out of it.  It should be clear by now how I feel about it, and I just hope that after reading today’s diatribe, the hyper-moralists who usually spend too much time caring about the private morality of others might realize that if they can’t change a species-old practice in humans, at least they can control it and make money off the sinners by making it legal.

 

 

TIME TO CALL A SPADE A SPADE, and a terrorist a terrorist.

 

Even Fox News, the channel that ushered in the term “homicide bomber” instead of the less potent “suicide bomber,” has seemed to fall under the spell of excessive-tolerance and liberal-speak when it comes to the Iranian UNC grad who mowed down a bunch of students in the name of Islam, calling him nothing more than a vengeful former graduate student in an online article dated March 6, 2006.  And conversely, it was actually an eighteen-year-old UNC freshman (yes, a college student who is normally expected to spout the liberal rhetoric of the left) who was actually quoted as daring enough utter the “T” word—yes, “terrorism”—when referring to Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar and what he did.

 

And you can imagine if this is how delicately Mohammed’s labeling was handled by Fox News, it doesn’t take a PhD in touchy-feely studies to realize that other print and broadcast media outlets are equally if not even more hesitant to call Mohammed what he is…an Islamic radical, and a terrorist.

 

Bizarrely, everyone—including Fox News—seems to be treating this dude by entirely different standards than they’d be treating a similar action by a like-minded Muslim in any other part of the world, such as Israel, for example.  Yes, what I’m saying is that American news outlets are acting like Al Jazeera when it comes to the way they describe this guy and it’s both ridiculous and a disservice to their readers, listeners and viewers.

 

Forget about the fact that the man seems sane (as opposed to the victim of “voices in his head” or hallucinations, and at least as sane as someone can be who thinks it’s OK to mow down kids with an SUV), forget the fact that he’s always smiling and seems to have no remorse for what he’s done, and forget the fact that he’s made it crystal clear that the reason for his crime was to avenge the deaths of Muslims at the hands of Americans and to “spread the will of Allah” (incidentally, the very same rhetoric used by other Muslim radicals to “justify” their actions or as I prefer to call them, TERRORISTS).  Yup, it seems that in the mind of the American media, what makes someone a terrorist are the incidental and now-cliché things like a bomber-vest, box-cutter and low-quality video for broadcast on Al-Jazeera after your death, and not, as it turns out, the substantive motivations that lead other jihadis to do what they do, nor other, more novel ways of harming innocent civilians that justify the terrorist label.

 

Look, I’m not saying this idiot doesn’t deserve due process, a fair trial and a presumption of innocence by the legal system, but what I am saying is that if it quacks and waddles like a duck, it’s a duck, and if it spouts anti-American rhetoric and engages in violence against innocent civilians in the name of revenge on behalf of Muslims like a terrorist, it’s a terrorist.  So let’s not play word games that only deceive and delude ourselves; let’s call a spade a spade, and a terrorist a terrorist—whether he’s English-speaking and American-educated, or whether he speaks Farsi and lives in Tehran.

 

 

AMERICAN PORTS, FOREIGN CONTROL: The truth behind the politics of port control.

 

Well it’s getting nasty inside the beltway again, and it’s just the kind of nastiness I enjoy: when prominent members of both parties team up to go head-to-head with the administration.  Every now and then it’s just nice to have a break from the typical Democrat v. Republican scuffles we’re used to and to have the opportunity to enjoy one of those rare battles between the two most powerful branches of the federal government—the executive and the legislative.

 

In this particular case, the fuss is over one of my favorite topics: relations between America and the Muslim world.  And the bipartisan uproar over the recent sale of a company that handles port operations at certain U.S. ports to a company owned by the United Arab Emirates makes it sound like ships pulling into those ports will be welcomed by turban-clad, Quran-thumping, Al Qaida members, happily ignoring U.S. laws and regulations and instead laying the foundation for their next big attack.

 

Now look: I’m as concerned (if not a lot more concerned) about homeland security as anyone and I’m the first person to raise a red flag when it’s warranted to do so.  And my point here is not to say that a sale like this shouldn’t be scrutinized to the fullest.  It should be scrutinized (which the administration says it’s already done), and politically, it would have also been a good idea for the Bush administration to at the very least run it past Congressional leaders to avoid getting so much egg on its face and opening up divisions within the Republican party.

 

But what annoys me about this case of bipartisan grandstanding is not so much its substance but rather its hypocrisy.  For example, congressional Democrats and Republicans criticize the fact that the United Arab Emirates was one of only a handful of countries to officially recognize the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, to not recognize the state of Israel, and they point out that UAE financial institutions were used to funnel money to the 9-11 terrorists.  Horrible?  Yes.  But unique?  No.

 

Despite the fact that the UAE was one of only a few countries to recognize the Taliban, not to recognize Israel, and whose financial institutions were used to funnel money to Al Qaida, it wasn’t as if the other countries to do so were insignificant, because they also included Saudi Arabia and Pakistan—two of our biggest allies in the war on terror, and arguably far more dangerous in their support for the Taliban and Al Qaida than the UAE.  After all, Saudi Arabia, whose oil we all cheerfully pump into our cars without hesitation or a second thought about where it originally came from (and therefore who might be making money off us each time we fill up), is where most of the 9-11 hijackers came from, the homeland of Osama Bin Laden himself (who was later expelled for threatening the regime), and most importantly, the source of funding for Islamic Madrassas across the globe responsible for a large part of the widespread and irrational hatred of America throughout the Muslim world.  But both Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, like the UAE, continue to make strides in the direction of purging terrorists from their midst, the Bush administration considers both to be key allies in the war on terror, and I agree that to criticize the UAE for the same offenses in spite of its help in the war on terror is a slap in the face to it, and to the Saudis and Paks who are just as guilty of the same offenses.

 

But that’s not all…another fact you’ll rarely if ever see or hear reported is that in addition to these Muslim countries, another key country found itself in the financial loop of the 9-11 terrorists: THE UNITED STATES.  Here’s a direct quote from a 9-11 commission staff report: “The September 11 hijackers used U.S. and foreign financial institutions to hold, move, and retrieve their money.  The hijackers deposited money into U.S. accounts, primarily by wire transfers and deposits of cash or travelers checks brought from overseas.  Additionally, several of them kept funds in foreign accounts, which they accessed in the United States through ATM and credit card transactions.”  Of course, no one would claim that America’s domestic link in the chain of terror financing should disqualify us from running our own ports.

 

The final bit of hypocrisy I’d like to point out involves the control and operation of U.S. ports.  Not only are ports publicly owned and only leased to companies—including the UAE company, and not only are all port workers union members and U.S. citizens, but the majority of U.S. ports are already operated by foreign companies—including companies based in China, that great bastion of democracy and human rights who, despite producing much of the affordable merchandise at Wal Marts and Dollar Stores across America, likely has at least a few nuclear missiles aimed at the US at this very second.

 

And this last point leads me to a final thought on this topic, and a possible silver lining in this whole port control mess.  See, when you own something and make a lot of money from it, you’re less likely to want to hurt or destroy it.  So just as China’s less likely to actually fire a nuke at it’s best customer—the United States, and just as the Saudi’s—in spite of their Wahhabi, non-American way of life—are helping us avoid future terror attacks on US soil because it doesn’t want to deal with a backlash from its best customer, maybe…just maybe…letting an Arab company run a few terminals at a few U.S. ports might help ensure that folks from that country’s neck of the woods will be less likely to want to do us harm.  And because we’re talking about an actual country and not a hard-to-find non-state actor like Al-Qaida, if they’re actually foolish enough to allow harm to come to America through our ports, they’ll know they can expect instantaneous and overwhelming retaliation that will make what we did to the Taliban look like we were just warming up.

 

READ MORE HERE

http://www.cfr.org/publication/9918/uae_purchase_of_american_port_facilities.html#6

 

 

BOYCOTT BUSEY & INSANE BILLY ZANE: Why there is no equivalence between Muhammad Cartoons and a New Turkish Movie.

 

When the Muslims of Bosnia and Kosovo were being slaughtered by their Christian neighbors in Serbia, it wasn’t the armies of Saudi Arabia (the home of Mecca), Pakistan (the only known nuclear power in the Muslim world), or Indonesia (where more Muslims live than in any other country in the world) that came to their defense.  The mainly-Christian United States and the West did.

 

When the tsunami hit Indonesia and other Muslim-populated areas, relief donations by the United States more than four times exceeded those of Islamic Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates combined. (source: turkishpress.com)

 

When Muslim Pakistan was hit with an earthquake last year killing 80,000 and leaving millions more homeless and hungry, it was again the United States coming through with aid contributions surpassing those of any Muslim country.

 

But it seems that regardless of all the good we do in situations like these around the world, and regardless of the fact that our oil addiction keeps many Muslim economies afloat, the fact that we support Israel, and the fact that we are perceived as Godless heathens keeps us as perpetual entries on the Muslim world’s shit list.  And because I think that Islam’s hatred of America and the West is rooted primarily in their resentment of our successes in spite of our “Godlessness,” I believe this hatred would still exist if we had never invaded Iraq or Afghanistan.  And in fact, it did indeed exist prior to even the first gulf war.

 

In other words, what I’m trying to say here is that despite the fact that in recent world history the US and the mainly-Christian West have done more to help the Muslim world than any other country in the Muslim world itself, we sadly don’t need any help in demonizing America and convincing the Muslim world that America and the West are no good.

 

The flap over the Mohammed cartoons that we’ve all heard about and that I’ve written about in two earlier blogs have shown us that the Muslim world’s ire is well-armed and on a short fuse that even the slightest non-violent provocation will cause to explode into bloody demonstrations, trade boycotts, diplomatic rifts, and the now-cliché Islamic death sentence (fatwa).   If this is what happens because of a cartoon, it doesn’t take a rogue nuclear scientist to tell you that an even less-satirical and more realistic portrayal of the already-hated Americans will not mend any fences between the West and Islam.

 

But that’s precisely what actors Gary Busey and Billy Zane have helped filmmakers do in a new Turkish movie called “Valley of the Wolves, Iraq.”  In this, the most expensive Turkish movie ever made, Zane plays an American soldier who oversees the slaughter of innocent Iraqi women and children at a wedding, and who then takes the survivors of the massacre to Abu Ghraib where a Jewish American doctor, played by Busey, cuts out their organs for sale in London, Tel Aviv, and of course, New York.  In Turkey, the most “liberal” and “pro-West” of Muslim countries where 53 percent of those responding to a recent Pew Global Attitudes survey associated Americans with the word "rude"; 70 percent with "violent"; 68 percent with "greedy"; and 57 percent with "immoral," advance tickets are selling out and Istanbul’s mayor said about the movie, “The scenario is great.”

 

Now I’m not saying that Gary and Billy shouldn’t have the freedom to choose the movie roles they play, nor am I calling for a bounty to be put on their heads for these or any other roles they may play—no matter how anti-American, and no matter how blasphemous.  I’m not calling for their expulsion from the Screen Actor’s Guild or from the United States itself, and I’m not calling for an ounce of jail time to be done by either.  Those things would be the typically-Muslim response to such transgressions.

 

But I am calling for the beautifully-democratic response: boycott—the choice of free peoples to not give one ounce of support to the work and causes of these individuals as a symbolic expression of displeasure with their poor decisions, and to let them know that their decisions and actions have consequences—and in this case quite negative consequences—that extend far beyond the paychecks they received for their work on the film…consequences that will extend to the rest of us Americans and the freedom-loving, democratic, Judeo-Christian west.

 

While this anti-American movie is a fictional portrayal of Americans just like the satirical cartoons of Muhammad are clearly fictional portrayals of Islam’s prophet, there’s still quite a big difference between the two.  While the cartoons of Muhammad inflamed anti-American passions throughout Islam, they actually created a pro-Muslim/pro-tolerance backlash in America and the West where the cartoons first originated.  Editors who published them were fired and suspended, peaceful interfaith protests underscoring the west’s religious tolerance were organized, and political leaders of western countries publicly condemned the cartoon’s publishing even though the publishing was done by a private, non-government entity.

 

But to me, the new Turkish movie is quite different; although fictional, I predict that it’s going to be viewed throughout the Muslim world as evidence of American atrocities and American evil.  If I’m right this will only further inflame anti-Western sentiment and lead to Muslim public opinion that is more likely to want to develop nuclear weapons, hate America and its people, and support terror.  The other key difference in the aftermath of the cartoon publications and the release of this movie is that the west—although it will not enjoy or embrace the movie—will certainly not threaten to sever diplomatic relations with Turkey, call for the Turkish government to publicly censure the filmmakers, or allow the kid of violence against Turkish interests to take place that many Muslim countries have allowed to take place against western interests in the wake of the cartoons.  And while Denmark’s embarrassment has been made public in the Arab world in the form of full-page apologies in Saudi and other Muslim newspapers, showing that the west does indeed care about how some among us made Muslims feel, I’m willing to bet money that no such shame will ever come to the Turkish filmmakers, nor will the west’s outrage that such a movie was ever created in the first place ever be known in the Muslim world.

 

I really, really hope I’m wrong about everything I’ve just written, and I hope that Muslims will actually rise up in anger against this movie just as they did against the cartoons.  But as much as I enjoy being right about most things, this is one of those rare occasions where a dangerous likely outcome makes it something I’d rather be wrong about.

 

Either way, boycott Busey and Zane; and forgive them, for they know not what they do.

 

 

THE MINUTEMEN: Not necessarily xenophobic…not necessarily racist.

 

The political left and so-called Mexican-American and Hispanic civil rights groups unfairly—and often with great success in the media—brand supporters of secure borders and things like border walls as xenophobic racists who don’t appreciate the fact that illegal immigrants risk life and limb to come to this country where they often do jobs that Americans are not willing to do.  Unfortunately for these groups, they’re wrong, and because they’re wrong, they’re being unfair to the real and justified concerns of people who, like me, favor more airtight border security

 

But being wrong isn’t their only problem.  The claims of pro-illegal immigrant groups also distract attention from the fact that the policies of these groups do more harm to illegal immigrants than any minuteman has ever done, and from the fact that their positions are rooted not in immigrant safety but in a desire for one of their key constituencies—illegal immigrants living in the US—to swell and be replenished via our insecure borders.

 

THE TRUTH ABOUT SUPPORTERS OF SECURE BORDERS

I first want to discuss the unfair portrayal of those who support more secure borders as xenophobic racists.  This is simply not true.  I, for one, am an American of Mexican descent who is the grandson of an illegal immigrant from Mexico.  And not only do I harbor no racial or ethnic animosity whatsoever toward the land of my ancestry, but also, I don’t blame Mexicans one bit for trying to get as far away as possible from the corruption and poverty of Mexico, nor for trying to enter the greatest country on the planet—America—by any means necessary.  As I’m fond of saying, there’s a good reason why my great grandmother decided to flee Mexico with my then two-year-old grandfather, and there’s a good reason she chose the United States as her ultimate destination.  Unfortunately for many Mexicans today, those good reasons remain an undeniable fact of life.

 

And just as we are not necessarily racist, we are not necessarily xenophobic.  Speaking for myself only, I have dear friends who are either U.S. citizens or legal U.S. residents from countries ranging from Canada, Mexico and India, to even Muslim countries like Turkey and Iran, and I would trust any of them with my life.  And even though all of these personal acquaintances of mine both arrived and stayed in the United States legally, I still harbor no intrinsic hatred or fear of anyone who either arrived or stayed illegally either.  I know that U.S. immigration laws can often be confusing and unfair, and I know that most illegal aliens aren’t in the US to intentionally hurt a single soul.  And finally, if magically I were given the power to make a list of people that I could have immediately deported from the United States, almost everyone I can think of expelling is a native-born U.S. citizen

 

ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT RIGHTS GROUPS DO MORE HARM TO ILLEGALS THAN EVEN THE MINUTEMEN

Their anti-border control rhetoric is a smokescreen cleverly disguising the fact that pro-illegal immigrant groups are actually doing more harm to illegal immigrants than any minuteman ever did.  Why?  Because their platform—including everything from their opposition to more strict border controls to their support of health, education and other social programs for illegals—lures illegals to our country and encourages them to risk life and limb in their treacherous journey north.

 

Ruthless coyotes who make money off the misery of Mexicans desperate to come to America, deaths and other casualties resulting from the dangerous journey across the desert on foot or in sealed cargo containers, billions of dollars in uncollected taxes from the illegal drug trade, the bloody drug war that plays itself out on Mexican streets, and a Mexican regime not motivated to fix itself and provide the hope of a prosperous life for its people—these are all encouraged by the present inadequate U.S. border control policy and its support by pro-illegal immigration groups.  However, it’s the stricter border control policies favored by the minutemen and their kind that have the exact opposite effect.  You don’t need a PhD in border policy to see that an open border encourages illegal immigration and all the negative consequences that come with it, while an impenetrable border would all but completely discourage it.

 

As someone quite sympathetic to both the cause of the supporters of stricter border security and the motivations of Latin American illegal immigrants who just want a better life for themselves, it’s pretty annoying to be falsely and unfairly branded as racist and xenophobic.  And it’s frankly ridiculous that those of us who are actually supporting what is legal and opposing what is illegal are painted out to be the bad guys by those falsely claiming to carry the banner of humanitarianism.

 

So just why are non-racist and non-xenophobic people like me in favor of tighter border control?  In a word: security.  Security from an illegal drug trade that leads to the importation of millions of dollars worth of untaxed goods and that props up violent Mexican drug cartels, security from a labor pool who while well-intended will undercut American employees with their willingness to work for less than what it’s legal to pay an employee in the US, and security from terrorists intent on inflicting mass casualties in the U.S. and who are likely to exploit our leaky borders to sneak in and do it.  That is the truth, and that is what’s really behind support for tighter border controls.

 

So when those who make their living tilting at the nonexistent windmills of xenophobia and racism make claims about the supporters of secure borders, don’t automatically take them at their word, and take what they say with a large dose of healthy skepticism, because the fact of the matter is that they’re often dead wrong.

 

 

POP QUIZ: LOCAL TV NEWS IS: a) gory b) sensational c) talent-less d) irrelevant ANSWER: e) all of the above

 

Blood, gore, sensationalistic plotlines, fear mongering, bad writing, and crappy talent.  What am I talking about?  No, not a bad, direct-to-video “B” movie starring daytime soap rejects.  No, not an amateur student film shot on a camcorder so a couple of academic underachievers could get a little extra credit in drama class.  No, what I’m describing is your home-grown, garden-variety, local network affiliate television news!

 

Yes, at some point in the recent past local TV news editors got the memo that important things like press conferences with city officials talking about things that actually affect our lives aren’t as “eye-catching,” “telegenic,” or “sexy” as stories about rare and isolated things that do not affect our lives, and do little but scare the crap out of us and…oh yeah…keep us glued to our TV as if it were a miniature car accident in our living room because local TV news is pretty much nothing but car accidents beamed into our living room.

 

Personally, my least favorite type of lead stories are the ones about tragic accidents that do little but give us an irrational fear of driving, stories about isolated murders that inspire irrational fears of home invasion, and—worst of all—stories about ongoing court cases that while “high profile” only because we’ve all heard of the parties involved, truly have zero impact on your life or mine.  Yeah, I’m talking about the Michael Jackson trials of the world and the idiot networks drawn to them like a shark to blood in the water.

 

But it’s not just stupid stories.  It’s also talent that’s often mediocre at best.  Why?  There are hundreds of media markets in the country, some with four or more local TV news establishments.  And many of those all feel compelled to have live newscasts early in the morning (which I don’t understand), a full hour at noon (which I don’t understand), another two hours between 4 and 6PM (an hour and a half of which I also don’t understand), and another half hour at 10 or 11PM (again—don’t get it).  In short, news organizations are forced to cover almost 10 hours of on-air news with a talent pool that you might be able to decently cover an hour with.  And since the “good ones” tend to be attracted to the pay and prestige of the bigger cities, the rest of us are stuck with the “B” and “C” teams of television journalism…bad hair, bad delivery, bad ties and all.

 

So in my usual spirit of constructive advice to help solve today’s problems and embarrassments, here’s my newsflash for local news: please remember where the word “news” comes from…“NEW”.  Murders, car accidents, death, rape and theft—while all horrible and sad—are not “new.”  Unless one of them happens with a regularity that indicates a serial or epidemic status, or unless seeing or hearing about the story is going to have a real (not imagined effect on our lives), then we don’t need a live shot of a reporter in front of a non-descript house, an accident, or any other random crime scene every damned night telling us about it.  It’s not news, it’s a statistic, so give it to us in a crawl at the bottom of the screen if you’re gonna give it to us at all.  Instead, as hard as it may be, tell us stuff that actually matters to us and affects our lives, or as some people like to call it…NEWS!

 

Next, once you take out the sensationalistic fluff, shrink wrap the day’s real news and serve it up in a 30-minute newscast during early-evening by your best anchor.  I say 30 minutes because you’re lucky if you even have that much real news, and I say early-evening because folks who work late can record it and watch it later.  And yes, I said just your best anchor.  Spare us the politically-correct and cliché male-female anchor “team” with token ethnic sports and weather wingmen, and take the cash you save by trimming the fat and hire someone attractive to look at and easy to listen to for the anchor desk, and take the money you save and hire good reporters to support him or her.  Then, because it’s good for a change, record it and rebroadcast it the next morning between five and 10AM when you typically find the third or fourth string anchors regurgitating the previous night’s news anyway.  If local news outlets did this, the five people who actually want 10 hours of live local news each day could visit a station’s website as often as they want to get it, and the rest of us could actually enjoy a decent television newscast featuring relevant, real news.

 

I know, I know…you may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one…and unlike John Lennon’s dream in the song “Imagine,” my proposed local TV news reforms—unlike world peace—actually have better than a snowball’s chance in Hell of actually happening.

 

 

PRAISE ALLAH I DON’T LIVE IN A MUSLIM COUNTRY: Unfortunately, Jihad Momani and Hisham Khalidi do.

 

Well it just gets worse every day.  As I mentioned in one of my recent diatribes the Muslim world has reacted to the publishing of cartoons featuring Mohammed in a way that Christian democracies hardly ever do…even when they are physically attacked by Muslims and their innocent civilians are killed.  In fact, while the Muslim world torches European embassies—including the embassies of countries not involved in the recent cartoon controversy—and makes calls of “death to…” European countries—including countries not involved in the recent controversy—I’m not aware of so much as one single demonstration in the streets of a major American city calling for “death to Afghanistan,” the home of Al Qaida, nor death to any other Muslim nation, much less the torching of any Muslim country’s embassy in Washington, DC, in the wake of 9-11.

 

And yes, while America did indeed topple the Taliban regime in Afghanistan in response to 9-11, can anyone really say that the murder of 3,000 innocents was not an adequate justification for retaliation?  But on the other hand, only Muslims seem to argue that cartoons—CAR-FREAKIN-TOONS—are adequate provocation for acts of violence against even countries unrelated to the controversy.  In a situation like this, it really makes you wish that Muhammad wrote the phrase “sticks and stones may break my bones but cartoons will never hurt me” into a passage in the Quran.  It sure would have saved a lot of Iranian Molotov Cocktails.

 

But just when I was about to completely lose my faith in the Muslim world’s ability to take the insulting cartoons with a grain of salt, I was pleasantly surprised and impressed by the courage and enlightenment of two Jordanian Muslim men, Jihad Momani and Hisham Khalidi.  Momani and Khalidi were (yes, were) editors of Jordanian newspapers who had the intestinal fortitude to republish the pictures because they knew that without an ability to view the comics for themselves, readers would have to rely on the word of government officials about their offensive nature.  This reliance on a few rulers to make decisions on the part of the many is the antithesis of democracy, and it is at the heart of almost every claim to power throughout the dictatorial and undemocratic Muslim world.  But as men who have faith in the ability of individuals to make up their own minds rather than needing beliefs and opinions to be spoon-fed to them by dictators, ayatollahs, or caliphs, they very democratically republished the cartoons for their readers to view and form opinions about on their own.

And my respect for Mr. Momani doesn’t stop there.  In addition to republishing the cartoons, his paper also ran an editorial which bravely said, "Muslims of the world be reasonable," and wisely posed the rhetorical question "What brings more prejudice against Islam, these caricatures or pictures of a hostage-taker slashing the throat of his victim in front of the cameras or a suicide bomber who blows himself up during a wedding ceremony in Amman?"

That’s the good news.  But here’s the bad news.  For their brave, nonviolent act and for their faith in the ability of their readers to decide for themselves and consider an opinion unpopular in the Islamic world, these heroes of freedom and symbols of moderation in Islam were not just fired, but jailed by the Kingdom of Jordan…one of the most moderate and pro-American regimes in the Arab and Muslim world whose king is an American-educated Georgetown University Alum and who, along with his wife, is a fluent English speaker.  Charged with “defaming prophets in public,” Jihad Momani and Hisham Khalidi, if convicted, they could serve up to three years in prison, and the moderate king has promised “no leniency” in their prosecution.  And finally, the Jordan Press Association, which you might expect to defend the actions of these men, has actually referred the men to a disciplinary committee saying “they have done something wrong and they must be punished.” How’s that for free press, ALCU?!

 

It’s the treatment of brave men like these in what is typically considered to be a moderate Muslim nation with a pro-America, pro-reform regime that should cause us to be quite concerned about everything from the democratization of the Muslim world to the security and reliability of our supply of foreign oil.  I mean think about it: if a cartoon is reason enough to recall ambassadors (see previous article here), cease all trade with an entire country and firebomb embassies, then just imagine what other kinds of nonviolent missteps by private citizens could lead Muslim countries to decide to just turn off our oil supply.  And it’s one of the reasons why we should both continue to coax the Muslim world gently towards democracy and freedom on the one hand, while exercising caution and cutting our dependence on goods and service—especially oil—from the politically volatile Muslim world on the other.

 

Like the Bible and the Torah, the Quran is a rather long book filled with stories and lessons about God and how God wants his human followers to act.  But while the New Testament of the Bible has frequent peaceful teachings like reminders to love our enemies, to forgive those who have trespassed against us, to not to judge others, and to turn the other cheek, the Quran seems to lack any such teaching or to even possess a passage that when liberally interpreted might actually be read to mean “chill out on folks who make you mad.  Because remember…I’m God…I’ve got pretty thick skin, OK?”  It’s too bad the Quran doesn’t have such a passage—both on an individual and on an international level—and it’s one of the reasons I’m glad I don’t live in a Muslim country.

 

 

SURVEILLANCE CAMERAS: Threat to liberty, or weapon against crime?

 

I think anyone who, like me, has spent a lot of time in Vegas—either visiting or living there as I once did—has become oblivious to the fact that their every move in public is being photographed and/or videotaped, and similarly, they’ve come to realize that the ACLU and other left wingers are over-hyping the whole “threat to privacy” that they believe widespread use of surveillance cameras pose to society.  But for those of you out there who haven’t had the pleasure of spending a lot of time in Vegas or another well-scanned city, and who are, like me, quite mindful of our civil liberties and have had their eyebrows raised by ACLU claims that cameras pose a threat to freedom and democracy as we know it, let me make two very important points.

 

POINT NUMBER ONE: what you do in public is just that…PUBLIC.  There’s a reason why the word privacy exists, and that’s to describe the realm in which you do and say things when you’re not in public.  There is no bigger civil libertarian than I, and anyone who reads my daily diatribes on this site knows that.  Whether it’s a person’s right to marry who they want or to smoke what they want when in private and as long as any negative effects remain with you in private, I think people’s freedoms should be as broad as possible, and that the realm of the private should always be free and protected.

 

However, most of the people who masquerade as “civil libertarians” like the ACLU, for example, wrongly define the sphere of the private as including a good chunk of the public domain or other people’s private domains.  Whether it’s a public street, in a public place, on the premises of another person’s private property on which their rules apply and not yours, or whether it’s your e-mail correspondence on computers at work that you don’t own and therefore aren’t private, we’re always being told by ACLU types that we’re entitled to privacy in those areas.

 

But they couldn’t be farther from the truth.  The fact is that anytime you’re in public, you’re in public.  And a camera watching over a city street isn’t seeing anything that another person who could legally be standing outside watching you (or watching you from inside their home or apartment for that matter) couldn’t also legally see.  And for that reason, the notion of suing the government over placing cameras to monitor public places is just as ridiculous as suing another citizen for being in the same public place and watching you.  And it’s the same when you’re on another person’s private property—whether it’s a public store or a private home.  If they want to tape you, then it’s their right to do so—including, frankly, in my opinion, whether you know it or not!

 

Because of their completely wrong definition of the private, civil liberties imposters like the ACLU are more like “pseudo-libertarians” than “civil” libertarians, and counterfeit civil libertarians and their overly-broad definitions of the private sphere do nothing but give real civil libertarians like me a bad name.  If you are in a public place or on another person’s private property, claims of “personal space,” “civil liberties,” and “privacy” simply have no place in the discussion.

 

POINT NUMBER TWO: cameras work.  As Chicago’s Mayor Daley said when he recently announced that Chicago businesses would be required to install cameras, “Cameras really prevent much crime. Cameras also solve a lot of crime. The terrorist attacks in London were solved by cameras. The whole incident was solved by cameras."  And let’s not forget about the criminals in Florida who were recently caught after a portion of their attacks in which they beat and killed homeless men were captured on camera.  And in still another example, in Wilmington Delaware, cameras have helped in 95 cases over the past six months alone.  Of course these examples are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the massive numbers of crimes that were solved because of surveillance camera footage.  But as big as that number is, it probably still pales in comparison to the number of crimes that never happened in the first place because cameras helped prevent them from happening.

 

The bottom line is this.  There are plenty of places in the world and even here in America where cameras are already everywhere, and if there were really any horrible consequences of widespread surveillance camera use, we would have heard about them by now—because the pseudo-libertarians would have made sure we heard about it.  So the fact that all we ever hear when these measures are debated and discussed is chicken-little fear-mongering should tell us that the people suggesting broader use of surveillance cameras in public are probably right, and that we have nothing to fear but the criminals who will be all too happy to continue doing their mischief knowing it’ll never be captured on film.

 

 

PAINT, DRAW, OR SKETCH ISLAM’S MUHAMMAD AT YOUR OWN RISK: Jesus is OK, though.

 

One of the most beautiful things about living in a western, Christian democracy is that I can post a humorous depiction of Jesus—the most important person in world history to Christians everywhere—on my site and not really have to worry that Christians will try to kill me or that Christian nations will recall their ambassadors from the United States because of what I did.  But apparently the same can not be said of Islam’s prophet, Muhammad.

 

I’m not sure if you’ve heard about it yet but a cartoon in Denmark depicting the Muslim Prophet Muhammad wearing a turban in the shape of a bomb with a burning fuse has caused so much international turmoil that you would have thought an Arab country had actually been physically attacked or economically sanctioned by the west.  But no, the mere publishing of a cartoon in a Danish newspaper (not even a newspaper in America—the great Satan, or in Israel—the little Satan) has ignited a diplomatic and literal firestorm in the Islamic world.  Sure the usual suspects voiced their anger: Palestinians added Danish flags to the American ones they burn daily, and the terrorists/new leaders of Palestinian territories, Hamas, called for a worldwide boycott of Danish products.  But on a much larger level Kuwait and Saudi Arabia have boycotted all Danish products, Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador to Denmark, its Islamic Affairs ministry called it “cultural terrorism,” Libya has closed its Danish embassy, the ambassadors of eleven Muslim countries to Denmark demanded apologies from the publisher, and of course, the peace-loving government of Syria called for the publishers to be punished.

 

Now as always let me get my disclaimers out of the way right off the bat before I tell you my take on the situation.  First of all I’m a big fan of satire—including political and religious satire—and I think that mature people and mature political and spiritual leaders should keep a stiff upper lip when they confront insults to themselves personally as well as to important people, gods and historical figures in the groups they represent.  I don’t necessarily like all of it, and I even think it can be in poor taste at times.  But one of the unique, and in my opinion, beautiful characteristics of modern democracies is our ability to legally poke fun at ourselves—even our most important religious and political figures—such as on Saturday Night Live where countless American presidents as well as Jesus Christ himself have been lampooned.  And it didn’t start there; political cartoons making fun of political and religious leaders—sometimes quite rude and crude—have been a part of America since its founding, and we seem to have done pretty well for ourselves in spite of it.

 

Not so in the Muslim streets of almost every single Muslim country where American flag burnings, George W. Bush effigy burnings, and chants of “death to America” are an almost daily occurrence if not a national pastime.  Even worse, some governments of Islamic states have both publicly and privately supported actual plans to destabilize our government and other western democracies by killing as many of our innocent civilians as possible, refused to recognize the sovereign state of Israel, and not only outlawed but punished by killing those people within its borders who practiced Christianity or any other religion other than Islam.  Yet to my knowledge, not a single country—not America, nor any of our western allies—has ever once yanked its ambassadors, threatened sanctions, or so much as demanded a simple apology in retaliation for any behavior short of the cold-blooded killing of its own people.

 

And not only is the response to such insults more mature on the part of the west, but the actions that inspire it are as opposite as night and day.  While the action that inspired boycotts, ambassador recalls, and undoubtedly a few new fatwas (or Islamic death sentences) too was an act of humor (albeit offensive humor), it was certainly not the organized, state-sponsored, and violence-promoting actions and chants that we routinely hear from the Arab and Muslim world.

 

Clearly, there is a double standard in the Islamic world that must be overcome if it is ever to fully integrate into modern, civilized, world society.  While their brothers and sisters can strap bombs on themselves and blow up as many innocent civilians as possible without reprimand and sometimes even with state-sponsored encouragement, acts of nonviolence—while possibly offensive—by one artist and one newspaper, bring the wrath of the Muslim world down upon an entire free country.  And while the recent publication of the offensive cartoon may have been in poor taste on one level, on another level it illustrates—quite literally—the very real, and moreover, the very justified concern on the part of the west about Islam’s tradition of militancy, violence, and revenge which can be traced all the way back to their prophet himself.

 

And if I may, I’d like to make one final political point.  Even though I hate flag-burning and flag-burners and wish that they would wrap themselves in the American flag before they set it on fire, the flap over the cartoon of Muhammad is exactly why I’m opposed to laws or a constitutional amendment banning the practice.  Because that’s what sets us apart from the repressive regimes of the world whose governments and people hate us so much; we allow the expression of nonviolent dissent even if it makes us uncomfortable—if for no other reason than to prove that our society and system of government is so strong that it can and frequently does survive such dissent.  While on the other hand, the repression of Muslim regimes seems prone to banning nonviolent expressions of dissent precisely because they fear what would happen if its people were actually allowed to say and express what they wanted, and they know that without such repression their own stability and hold on power would be severely weakened.  In other words, a strong society has nothing to fear from dissent, but a weak one most certainly does, and it will undermine any and all attempts at dissent—both at home and in Denmark—“by any means necessary,” to quote one of Islam’s own adherents.

 

READ MORE HERE...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4670370.stm

 

JUDICIAL JUNKETS: Threat to democracy, or no big deal?

 

Well here comes another diatribe that I’m gonna once again beg my liberal friends to hear me out on before you think I’m just being a knee-jerk conservative which I’m not.  (Remember: I’m a staunch non-partisan and you know I’ve got your back on plenty of issues—so please read/listen to today’s diatribe with an open mind).

 

I’m not sure if you’ve heard about it but ABC News’s chief investigative correspondent Brian Ross, whose reports I usually enjoy, just came out with a major exclusive report about U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia.  Apparently when the new Chief Justice John Roberts was being sworn in, Scalia was not only not at the swearing-in ceremony, but he was in Colorado at a junket sponsored by the Federalist Society, a legal organization usually branded as evil by liberals, where he did things like lecturing to the attendees and even playing tennis and fishing!  The nerve!!!

 

At first glance I agree this isn’t what I would call “good P.R.” for Justice Scalia, who I’ve long considered to be my favorite justice.  Not only did he miss the rare and important occasion of the swearing in of a new chief justice, but his trip—which included hobnobbing with conservatives, fishing, and playing tennis—was paid for by a conservative organization that gave its members exclusive access to one of our nation’s highest ranking judicial authorities.  In light of recent allegations of influence-peddling in Congress by lobbyists who used their client’s cash to buy favorable congressional action, I can understand why Scalia’s trip looks pretty suspicious and maybe even inappropriate to the casual observer.

 

But after a closer examination of the situation, I’ve got to say that I’m not as worried and bothered as ABC’s Brian Ross clearly appears to be, and you shouldn’t be either.  Let me explain why.

 

First of all, there’s a massive difference between the average U.S. Supreme Court justice and the average member of congress.  The biggest difference is that justices, like all other members of the federal judiciary, have life tenure once appointed by the President and confirmed by the U.S. Senate.  On the other hand, Members of Congress (the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate) are elected—and re-elected if they’re lucky—every two years if they’re Rep’s and every six years if they’re Senators.  So while federal justices will have their jobs tomorrow, next year, and 20 years from now no matter what assuming they’re still alive, and regardless of whether or not they please a given constituency or political faction, Reps and Senators are constantly “running for office,” concerned with fundraising, legislating, and in short, pleasing one faction or another lest they lose their next race and find themselves unemployed and on the street in two or six short years.

 

So when Scalia goes on a junket, he does so knowing that he is beholden to no one—not the sponsors of the junket, not one political faction or another, not even the president…nobody.  This is exactly why our justices and other members of the federal judiciary have life tenure—to help insulate them from outside influence which the founders of our constitution wisely anticipated as they designed our system of government.  He can preach to the choir at the junket, or he can piss them off—either way he goes back to his job the Monday morning after the junket.

 

But when a member of Congress goes on a junket, it’s a different story altogether.  Even though he or she may say or do something to tick off the sponsors, they do so at their peril.  Campaign contributions—the lifeblood of modern political races—could be jeopardized, constituents could be alienated, and in short, the member’s political future could be endangered permanently.  And because of the dire consequences of ticking off a junket’s sponsor or participants, members of Congress—unlike Justice Scalia—are under very real financial and political pressure to make a sponsor happy, and gifts, getaways and golf are a great and questionable way for someone to guide a member in the direction the group wants them to go.

 

The next reason I’m not so concerned is that Scalia is associating with a group and its members that we would totally expect Scalia to associate with.  In other words, his participation in the junket and his association with the group isn’t anything that’s going to change his mind or make him behave differently than he would had he not attended the junket.  If anything, Scalia is so freakin’ brilliant that the hacks out there with him on the golf course and tennis courts are going to be the ones having their minds changed.  It’s not like Scalia was confirmed as a justice who believes the constitution should be interpreted according to today’s norms and definitions, and it’s not like the trip ABC’s Brian Ross describes is going to morph him into someone different than he was the day he was confirmed.  Quite the opposite: Scalia is being Scalia, and he’s getting the Ritz-Carlton weekend because of who he is—knowing he’s beyond influence—while members of Congress get trips and gifts because of who junketeers want them to be.  Big difference.

 

Think of it this way: hypothetically, the conservative Federalist Society could have invited Ruth Bader Ginsberg to its Colorado retreat, wined her and dined her, taken her out on the links golfing and out on the lake fishing, and intently listened to her liberal lectures about the constitution.  But the Federalists would never do that because like Humpty Dumpty, all the gifts and all the golf won’t turn Ruth-baby into a Federalist, not to mention the fact that they’d probably rather visit the dentist than listen to her talk about her judicial philosophy!

 

Because Scalia is someone insulated (as much as one can be insulated) from outside influence while other elected officials are not, stories like this in popular news venues do nothing but distract the general public (who generally knows what it knows about politics from what it sees on TV) from the real problem—improper and inappropriate influence of those who are more susceptible to it…Senators and U.S. Representatives in Congress.

 

So before I wrap today’s diatribe let me give my liberal listeners and readers some words of comfort since I’ve basically just stuck up for my favorite justice who also happens to be hated by every liberal friend of mine.  Although you may be depressed and sad about the fact that President Bush has just successfully appointed two apparently conservative justices to the court, remember this: justices don’t always live up to the hype once they get on the bench, and historically some of the most liberal justices in recent history have been appointed by Republicans.  Earl Warren, one of the most liberal chief justices of all time, was actually a popular Republican governor appointed to the bench by fellow Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower (who reportedly once said that one of the biggest mistakes of his presidency was appointing Warren to the high court).  Similarly, Justice Harry Blackmun was a lifelong Republican and appointed to the bench by Republican Richard Nixon before authoring the infamous Roe v. Wade decision, revered by liberals to this day.  Anyway I’m not sharing this with you as a way of saying I hope the same phenomenon takes place with Roberts and Alito, but it’s just my way of saying…ya never know!

 

 

GOOGLE vs. BUSH: Weren't Republicans Supposed to be the Party of Smaller Government!?

 

I’ll tell you right off the bat that when I’m looking for something online, the only search engine I use is Google.  And over the past few days, I’m proud to say that Google is the only search engine getting my business and not the other big, and as it turns out cowardly search engines like MSN or Yahoo.  Why?  Because when the US Justice Department asked all three companies to give it their millions of lists of things that people had searched for—in some cases possibly revealing things that people don’t want the government to know—while MSN and Yahoo turned into DOJ’s little minions, only Google had the intestinal fortitude to stand up to Attorney General Gonzales and say “no.”

 

When I first heard that the U.S. government wanted lists of searches from search engines I automatically assumed it had something to do with terrorism.  I made that assumption because of the recent controversy over the Bush administration spying on terror suspects without warrants, and also, I could at least see the utility of wanting to track down someone named “Achmed” or “Mohammed” who googled “how to assemble a suitcase nuke and secretly deploy it in a way that maximizes casualties.”

 

But it turns out I was wrong.  Surprisingly, the government says that it wants to have records of Google searches to help prevent children from accessing pornography.  I say “surprisingly” because despite the hopeless goal of fighting kids’ access to pornography (if the porn’s there, kids are gonna find it), terrorist strikes pose a far greater danger to America than kids looking at boobies by any measure.

 

To put it bluntly, the Department of Justice’s demand that Google or any other search engine turn over information of the type recently requested is patently foolish.  If the government wants to know if it’s possible for a kid to hop online and find porn using a search engine, let me do my civic duty and save government attorneys the effort of preparing and submitting subpoenas—YES, kids can, and do, look for and find porn using search engines.  Now Bush administration, wasn’t that a lot easier than facing another round of accusations in the media of more big brother tactics?

 

Look.  Search engines are to online porn what our uncle’s mattress was to Penthouse and Playboy.  They’re a means to an end—an end that hormonal kids are gonna find whether repressed conservatives who fear pornography more than the devil himself like it or not.

 

And if the government doesn’t want to just take my word for it and wants to know what kind of titillating smut it’s possible to find through Google, Yahoo, MSN, or AOL, then instead of subpoenaing other people’s searches, why don’t they just search those engines for themselves?  Are the disciples of Reverend Ashcroft and Pastor Gonzales just too pure or prude to think of words that might yield an X-rated buffet of sexy sites?  Or maybe they already know that even G-rated words can lead to G-spots, and they’re afraid they just might enjoy their results a little too much.

 

In conclusion, I confess that I’m not a pornophobe like the Bush administration and many Republicans seem to be.  And although I may not agree with their pornophobia, I do respect any parent’s right to limit their kids access to porn or anything else they deem dangerous or wrong.  But I do have a problem when Bush Republicans, allegedly the party of smaller government and the party of families raising kids (not laws or governments raising kids), take refuge in meddling government instead of meddling moms and dads.  So Attorney General Gonzales, remember what Bob Dole said in response to Hillary’s book It Takes a Village; “It takes a family,” said Dole, reminding us that it’s a parent’s responsibility to raise their kids—not the government’s.  And when parents parent, our private online searches don’t need to be anyone’s business but our own.

 

 

AL JAZEERA: AL QAIDA’S P.R. FIRM.

 

I used to only have a problem with Al-Jazeera because of its biased portrayal of terrorists as “martyrs” and “freedom fighters,” and because of its equally biased portrayal of the U.S. and its allies against terrorism as “anti-Muslim” and “imperialists.”  Despite the fact that U.S. and allied forces are in their part of the world because we were provoked by naked aggression, and despite the fact that we’re taking military action that even a hawk like Rumsfeld would probably rather not take if he didn’t think we were in the crosshairs of people who have threatened to kill as many of us as possible, we are made to look like the bad guy whenever innocent women and children happen to be in the same house where top al-Qaida deputies are having dinner when a CIA drone takes the place out.  On the other hand, when al-Qaida, Palestinian suicide bombers in Israel, or Iraqi insurgents intentionally kill as many innocent Muslim civilians as possible—often scores of people—they are merely painted as patriots trying to expunge infidels from Muslim lands.

 

But the insurgent’s strategy appeared to backfire—at least for a time—and news reports of Islamicide by Muslims, often on stations like Al-Jazeera, started to turn the tide of pro-insurgent sentiment in the Arab and Muslim world around.  And although they continue to use terms like “terrorize” to describe the annoying yet nonviolent use of sonic booms by Israel to create upheaval in Gaza, while using the generic term “fighters” to describe the Muslim murderers, kidnappers and suicide bombers, at least they seem to indicate their support for the release of innocent hostages, and they similarly pay lip service to the fact that they categorically oppose things like the kidnapping of innocents.

 

Then Jill Carroll, an anti-war yet American reporter was taken hostage and the newest bin Laden tapes got released…on Al-Jazeera.  And all of the sudden, what had not really hit me before on numerous occasions over the past few years, became more disturbing: despite it’s claims to journalistic neutrality, and whether or not it realizes it, Al-Jazeera has become Al Qaida’s PR firm, and a willing accomplice to them and terror groups like them, without whom (or without the assistance of news organizations like it), Al Qaida would not have the ability to secretly pass along its messages of hate and threats of terror to the west, nor would hostage-takers be able to “complete the loop” of hostage taking by informing their targets of their demands, confident in their ability to do so easily while hiding behind the veil of a “neutral” news organization.

 

Think about it for a second.  If I’m a kidnapper, I need to make sure that I can get the word out to the people I’m trying to get something out of.  Now normally our eyebrows don’t get raised when we see kidnappers in the media making their demands because most kidnappers we’re used to know that we already know where they are.  They’ve taken hostages in a bank or shopping center and the problem is one of negotiation and extraction.  But in the case of hostages like those taken in Iraq by Islamic terror groups, nobody knows where they are—except, as it turns out, Al-Jazeera—and as such the terrorists are provided  with an additional level of insulation in the threat-loop.  They’ve got just a tad bit more security in keeping their location secret than if they had to creep just a smidge more into the daylight in order to make their aims known.

 

So what’s the alternative?  If Al-Jazeera and other respectable news organizations immediately started refusing to be a link in the threat-loop of kidnappers, terrorists would have to figure out another way to communicate their demands.  True enough, they may still take hostages, and they could still communicate their demands, but it would be slightly more difficult, and slightly more vulnerable.  As such it may not end kidnappings forever, but in the war on terror, aren’t we looking for each and every edge we can gain, no matter how small it may be?

 

Similarly, if news organizations like Al-Jazeera stopped broadcasting videos of bin-Laden, al-Qaida could still spew their insanity and hate, maybe via the internet or dead drops of videos and cassettes.   But similar to the hostage-taking example, that, too, would become more vulnerable for terrorists as they would lose the level of insulation that Al-Jazeera gives them, and they’d be forced to communicate with the outside world in a way ever-so-slightly more likely to divulge their whereabouts.

 

Maybe I’m being too hard on A.J., and perhaps our people at pay grades and levels of expertise far higher than mine think that news organizations like them provide an important service and link to these groups—and if that’s the case I sure hope someone corrects me.  And maybe in some macabre way, someone actually thinks encouraging kidnappings and other videotaped threats and atrocities is a good thing because it forces these secretive operators to communicate with the outside world and possibly give away their locations.  But if that’s really the case, we should have covert operators as hostage-taker bait—not innocent civilians—and everyone…and I mean EVERYONE…who even might be considered a target for a kidnapper, should be microchipped with an On-star type tracking device.  If it’s good enough for Fido and Kitty, or for our cars, then it should be good enough for every reporter, contractor, and certainly every man and woman in uniform too.

 

 

CRABS: WHY PAY THROUGH THE NOSE TO EAT SOMETHING SO FLAVORLESS AND DEADLY TO CATCH?

 

I was recently on the west coast and had the opportunity to do something that someone like me who grew up in a landlocked state doesn’t often get the chance to do: eat at a real seafood restaurant right on the ocean, featuring things caught fresh from the sea.  It was beautiful—seagulls glided past from time to time, the serene waters of the ocean lapped against the rocks on the shore, and really gorgeous waitresses walked in and out of the dining room bringing drinks and huge trays of things that just a few hours earlier were alive in the saltwater outside the window I sat next to.

 

But against this beautiful backdrop, something just kept bothering me.  Something just didn’t seem right at all.  Something was really confusing the heck out of me.  Why was the most expensive thing on the menu the thing that was the most void of taste, the thing that looked the most unappetizing, and the thing that was most deadly to catch?  Yes, I’m talking about CRAB.

 

Look, my astrological sign is cancer and I think crabs are cool and all, especially when you look at them from an ecological perspective because I’m sure that they, like all the other animals out there, have their role to play in “maintaining the gentle balance” of nature in the great food chain in the ocean.  And I even think they look kind of cool too—the pinchers, the hard exoskeleton, the fact that every now and then you see a blue one—all very cool.  But why the hell anyone would want to eat one, and not just eat one but pay through the nose to eat one, and worst of all risk their life to try to catch them is truly beyond me.

 

While crab fans will try to sell you the line that crab meat is delicious, in and of itself, the truth of the matter is that crab meat, like lobster meat, doesn’t have much taste at all, and the only reason most people eat it like they do is because they practically infuse it with butter.  And let’s be honest—anything soaked in as much butter as people normally soak their crab meat in will taste good.  To paraphrase Bill Clinton, “It’s the butter stupid!”  And if it’s not butter, it’s some other spice or the tasteless meat is just drowned in an overpowering sauce (usually over pasta) to give the sauce a little texture and the person eating it a little protein.

 

And there’s another reason (in addition to it’s butter-dunked flavor) why people gorge themselves on crab, and it’s the same reason that people gorge themselves on other disgusting things that they inevitably pay too much money for and that have dubious dietary value.  What’s the reason?  Herd mentality.  Crab, we are told, like other gross fare like foi gras, steak tartar, lobster, and “fine wine” is a “delicacy,” and as such, we are to suspend our taste buds’ ordinarily trustworthy judgment because people with “more refined” and “more developed” tastes than our own tell us that the stuff is really delicious and worth blowing huge wads of cash on.  And if it’s written up in magazines, featured by Bobby Flay on the Food Network, and, of course, expensive, then it must be delicious, right?  Yeah…and the emperor’s new garments are truly exquisite as well.  And if crab (and other disgusting foods) isn’t called a delicacy, it’s called an “acquired taste,” a label which always prompts me to warn, “if it needs to be acquired, that should be a red flag.”

 

The fact that should you decide to actually eat crab, you’ll end up having to practically take out a loan to afford it, is very much related to the fact that fishing for crab is one of the most deadly jobs on the planet (in the civilized world, at least).  I was watching a show the other night on TV about the dangers of crab fishing season and next to the danger crab fishing entailed, what I found most fascinating about it was that this was a job that was totally unnecessary, and one that wouldn’t even exist if everyone was like me and hated crab.  No, these people were out there in the freezing ocean risking life and limb to net as many crabs as possible not to cure cancer or to achieve the salvation of humanity, but because gluttons from the free world would pay good money to eat the tasteless rubbery meat beneath the shell, and that in turn means good money to catch the little suckers so they can be put on our tables.  And again, I’m not saying the eating or catching of crab should be illegal or banned or anything—I’m a big free marketer and as long as nobody’s forced at gunpoint to either fish for or eat crab, it’s all good with me.  But I am just wondering why in the name of God in the absence of a gun to their heads people would eat and fish for the things.

 

“But Jason,” you might be saying, “what if there’s a good dietary reason to eat crab?  There are plenty of gross things out there to eat and if something’s healthy, shouldn’t we eat it even if it doesn’t taste like much of anything and has a rubbery texture?  Isn’t no price too high to pay when we’re getting amazing nutrition?”  Well, I’m not Jewish but I’m good with the Jewish rationale that eating bottom feeders is pretty unappetizing, and again, all things being equal, I’m going with the healthy food (of which there are plenty of other options than crab) that doesn’t cost a year’s salary to eat, doesn’t require cheating death to procure, and actually tastes good.

 

To this day I’m puzzled about the fact that somewhere far back in human history one of our forefathers looked at a crab with its pinchers, hard exoskeleton and antennae and said to him (or her) self, “Mmmm!  That looks tasty!  I think I’d like to eat that!”  It would be one thing if crab (along with crawfish and lobster, the crab’s fellow pinchered crustaceans) were delicious or immediately removed wrinkles or caused a spontaneous orgasm when eaten, but the fact that none of these tasteless crustaceans do any of those things or anything else but cut you when you try to cut into them to get to the meat, and cost an arm and a leg to buy, leave me wondering why on earth people pay out the nose to eat them, and why people die every year working hard to put the things on our tables.

 

 

TV’s “INSIDER”: THE FALL OF A ONCE-DECENT ENTERTAINMENT SHOW.

 

Have you ever seen the TV show “The Insider”?  If not, it’s that daily half-hour entertainment news show hosted by Pat O’Brien (after whom the show is supposed to have gotten its name because he’s so “well connected” in Hollywood).  I remember when the show was first being rolled out I was actually really excited to hear that a show like “The Insider” was coming to TV.  I liked the premise of the show—that because of its unprecedented access to celebrities and exclusive interviews it would give you the real, behind the scenes stories of Hollywood without having to resort to the paparazzi footage and other tabloid BS that other shows and publications had to resort to because they didn’t have the access The Insider did.  And believe it or not I also liked the host Pat O’Brien who I used to watch do late-night Olympic coverage when he was still in the sports world.

 

And man did they promote the hell out of that show before its launch.  I remember seeing Pat O’Brien interviewed on every show possible for practically a month before the first episode aired and when it finally did, it was like an orgasm after a five-hour buildup of foreplay and sex.  And it didn’t disappoint…at least not initially; “The Insider” lived up to its name by featuring daily interviews with Pat O’Brien live on location with A-list celebs on the sets of their new movies—interviews you couldn’t see anywhere else because only Pat was the real “Insider,” and only Pat could penetrate the inner sanctums of Hollywood’s hottest actors and actresses.

 

But time passed, The Insider’s “new car smell” began to fade, and oh yeah…Pat O’Brien got high and in a drugged up trip, he left a sexually-charged, profanity-laden phone message on the answering machine of some dame he was dating.  As with everything else in celebrity-land, the message saw the light of day, Pat was shamed, and he took a hiatus from the show to get drug treatment.

 

Now at this point I’m still a fan.  While I don’t condone drug use whatsoever, I also don’t put B and C level celebs on a pedestal and expect moral leadership or role modeling from them either.  And besides—Pat did what he should have done; he got the help he needed, made a triumphant return to the show, and a-la post-prostitute Hugh Grant, he even faced the music and did a prime time sit-down with Dr. Phil.

 

I’m not at all sure whether Pat’s drug ordeal is the actual cause of The Insider’s fall, but whatever the actual reason, the show has been steadily tanking since Pat’s return…and oh, how it’s tanked.

 

The once proud Insider, which used to lead off its broadcasts with headlines about their latest A-list celebrity “gets,” now leads off with stories that make you think you’re either watching “Jerry Springer, Celebrity Edition” or a circus side show.  Lead stories now use standard paparazzi footage of stars being stalked as they get into their cars from restaurants instead of legitimately-obtained “insider” footage, celebrity interviews have been replaced by interviews with gossip columnists about the celebrities, and worst of all, lead stories on The Insider now include sideshow features about non-celebrities like the 1000 pound man, the anorexic twins, hideous plastic surgery addicts, and recently, a telephone interview with confessed murderer Eric Menendez who probably any Podunk newspaper could book if they were desperate enough to waste space talking about him.  Even more disgusting than this is the fact that The Insider draws these sensationalistic stories about tabloid topics into series, subjecting their poor viewers to multiple updates on people like the anorexic twins that last for weeksAlas, poor Insider, I knew it well Horatio.”

 

Ah but it doesn’t stop there….the fall of The Insider doesn’t end with the abandonment of insider interviews and their replacement with Jerry’s kids…Jerry Springer’s kids; no, the Insider has recently added to its arsenal of weak and unknown correspondents in an apparent attempt to rehabilitate its “insider” reputation.  So who are these cooler than cool, hotter than fire correspondents?  They are…ready for this…none other than the beefy Clay Aiken and the A-list’s Kathy Lee Gifford.  Come on Insider!  Even the show “Extra” hired the Sugar Ray lead singer Mark McGrath, who despite being talentless is at least more hip and “in” than Clay Aiken, today’s answer to Barry Manilow, and Kathy Lee, best known as Cody and Cassidy’s mommy.

 

And what about the celebrities who actually do agree to an actual Insider interview?  Well, they’re from such an ancient era that The Insider should probably consider changing its name to “Stars of the 70’s: Where Are They Now?”  Recent guests include old-timers like Regis Philbin, Barry Manilow, Frankie Valli, and The Captain and Tenille.  Well, I guess what you lose in A-list interviews you gain in insider information for your next dead pool!

 

In closing, we may never know why its executive producers chose to maintain The Insider’s original integrity like a meth head maintains her teeth, but when the final credits roll at least we know this: don’t show tapes of The Insider to Gitmo detainees unless you want a legal fight with Amnesty International because last time I watched the show, it was torture.

 

 

PIT BULLS: WHY TRASHY, LOWLIFE DOG OWNERS—NOT PIT BULLS—ARE THE REAL PROBLEM.

 

Pit Bulls are the Rodney Dangerfield of the dog world.  And not only do they get no respect, but lots of people—most of whom have never owned or even met one—actively hate them and want them banned for no reason other than sensationalized coverage of rare, albeit vicious, attacks on humans.  But the reality is that a pit bull is actually like a handgun—in the hands of the wrong person, it can be quite dangerous, but in the hands of a decent, law-abiding dog-owner, it doesn’t hurt anyone and can actually be one of the sweetest pets you’ve ever known.

 

One thing that I’ve noticed about people who hate pit bulls and think they should be banned is that they’ve never in their life actually met a pit bull.  I’m not saying they’ve never seen a pit bull.  We’ve all seen images of the vicious ones on television after they’ve mauled someone, but I’m talking about actually meeting one.  And because they’ve never met one they’re forced to draw a conclusion only from those they know of—the abused, fighting-trained ones owned by human scum that they’ve seen on TV.  But the truth is that the myth that pit bulls are naturally vicious is just that—a myth. 

 

So the question that naturally arises is this: why, if pit bulls are no more vicious than other breeds, do we only hear about pit bull attacks.  There are actually two very good answers to that question.  The first has to do with the breeds of dogs people choose for themselves, and the second has to do with the way the media covers dog attacks.

 

First, let’s look at how people select the breed of dog they want to own.  Some people want dogs that are cute, some want a good guard dog, some just want companionship, and other folks just might want a little tiny dog to sit in their laps while they watch television.  But in general, most people just want a good, solid, dependable dog who will provide them with the qualities they’re looking for and won’t kill them or their families, and they end up with breeds like the cuddly lab, the cute Bijan, or the socially conscious pound puppy.  In other words, they go with the breeds that get good press, and that media glamorization makes it fashionable to want, just like they want any other article of clothing or gadget that you see on TV or in the movies.  Maybe they’ve seen old Lassie movies and go for the collie, or maybe you like Wegman photography and opt for a Weimaraner instead.  Maybe you worship Paris Hilton and think a Chihuahua would be a nice small dog to clean up after, or better yet, reruns of Benji make you do the more responsible thing and get a pound puppy.  But whatever they do, most people who want a dog don’t go for the pit bull because the only press pits get is bad press.

 

But not everyone selects dogs that way.  Some people, namely criminals, gangsters, and meth chefs want dogs that will hardly ever be around humans, instill fear upon people, and guard contraband with their lives…literally.  There is a miniscule subset of dog breeds that fits the bill for this, and popular breeds like Sharpeis, Cocker Spaniels, labs, and certainly toy breeds like Chihuahuas and Shi-Tzu’s won’t help ward off rival gangs, penniless addicts, or the law.  You’re pretty much looking at a Doberman, a Rotweiler, or yes, the ever-vilified pit bull.  That explains why there are so many criminals and low lifes with pit bulls, but what about pit bull attacks in a non-criminal setting?  The truth in those cases, which never gets reported, is that they attacked in a way that any other breed would have attacked given the same set of circumstances.

 

The second reason you only seem to hear about pit bull attacks involves the media.  It should come as no surprise to anyone that the media loves blood, gore and death above all else.  There’s a reason why the expression “if it bleeds it leads” has become such a cliché in out culture—because it’s true.  The media has a horrible habit of planting irrational fears in our minds each morning in the paper and each night on the news.  Whether it’s highlighting shark attacks even when they’re statistically down worldwide, or whether it’s warning of terror attacks after the umpteenth video threatening them is aired on Al-Jazeera even though none have actually been followed by an attack since 9-11, the media routinely behaves like Chicken Little with his head cut off because he’s suffering from bird flu.

 

And sadly, it’s no different when it comes to the media’s coverage of the dog world.  Seeing eye dogs help the blind every day, drug dogs discover pot every day, our family dogs at home bring love and joy to our families, and collectively dog activities like these do far more good for the world that pit bull attacks could ever undo.  But when you watch the news, although you might occasionally hear the touchy-feely story of a dog finding a person buried in the rubble after an earthquake, or the story of a dog who dialed 911 and saved its owner, you will never hear them that often, and you will never hear stories like those at the beginning of a newscast.  But—if a stupid little kid, who was not being properly supervised by his stupid parents, who tried to pet his stupid meth-head uncle’s pit bull gets his face torn off, you can bet your bottom dollar that it will lead the newscast, be front page above the fold, and reignite calls for the pit bull as a breed to be banned.  I find it funny how nobody would ever use that logic to call for the banning of Islam just because of a few Muslim terrorists.

 

Still not convinced?  Then consider what happens in the press when dog breeds other than pit bulls attack.  Nothing.  Zip.  Nada.  It actually happened recently but I bet you didn’t hear about it.  Remember the French chick who got a face transplant?  Guess why she needed a new face.  It’s because it was ripped of by a vicious, evil…LAB!  Yup, a cuddly Labrador retriever.  But you wouldn’t know it.  When a pit bull’s not involved the story is about overcoming the maiming, the ethics of the treatment, and the annoying French accents of her surgeons.  But if it had been done by a pit bull, the headline would have screamed, “French Woman Defaced by Vicious Pit Bull.  Calls Mount to Ban the Breed.”

 

So let’s get past sensationalistic media coverage and the dog choices of criminals and give pit bulls the respect they deserve.  Because I, for one, will only support a ban on pit bulls as a breed if we can actually ban local news fear-mongering with ridiculous stories like “the deadly consequences of driving in flip-flops” and “the hazardous perils of buying designer knockoff purses.”  Crappy local news….I think I just got an idea for a future diatribe!

 

 

WHY DOES ANYONE CARE ABOUT THE GOLDEN GLOBES?  IF YOU DO, READ THIS AND YOU WON’T CARE ANYMORE!

 

My last couple of diatribes have been on a topic about as serious as you can get…capitol punishment.  So today I thought I’d lighten things up a bit.  You know, I really find it quite shocking and quite pathetic that we, as a country, seem to give so much attention to the Golden Globes.  Granted, it ain’t the Oscars, but you can’t tell me that you’ve never heard it described as the “prelude” to the Oscars or a “good predictor” of who will be nominated for or even win Oscars.

 

So why am I so amazed at our infatuation with the Golden Globes?  In my book, as far as films go, The Golden Globes don’t even have the stature or prestige that the American Music Awards or even the Billboard Music Awards have for the music industry.  That’s because those two lesser awards shows, while they may not have the prestige of the Grammies, at least reflect some level of accomplishment in the music industry like sales and popularity in America.  But the Globes?  The Globes are merely Hollywood’s PR tool for making you give a darn about certain movies before they can similarly use the tool of an Academy Award nomination once they’re announced.  But other than that, do you even know who gives out the Golden Globes?  Hopefully by the end of this diatribe you’ll know, and if you’re like me, you won’t give a damn about the prestige-less Golden Globes.

 

Let me start by asking a question.  Does anyone care about the Juneau Awards?  Does anyone in America even know what the Juneaus are?  Probably not many, and for those of you who don’t know what the Juneau’s are they’re the Canadian equivalent of the Grammies, only unlike the Grammies, only Canadians are nominated which means only Canadians can win.  Why does this award exist?  Because in general, in popular music (Gordon Lightfoot and Anne Murray not withstanding), America is better than Canada, and if Canada didn’t have their own awards show they’d rarely, if ever, win the more coveted and American Grammy or any other American award, for that matter.  But why don’t we know what the Juneaus are or who recent winners are?  Because as horrible as it sounds, we really don’t give a damn what they think up in the Great White North.  Yeah, yeah, you could argue that we don’t care what they think because they’re rewarding something Canadian, but do you really think we’d care much even if American artists were in the mix?  Probably not.  Why?  Because we have our own award, the Grammy, which is more prestigious mainly because—well—because it’s American.

 

Now you would think that if we don’t really care what Canadians, who are basically just Americans with an annoying French-speaking minority, think about one of our major art forms, you’d think we also wouldn’t care what anyone else in the world thinks about our movies and television either.  I mean hey—the new Iranian President just banned all American and Western music…he clearly has an opinion about it.  And while it’s a crummy thing to do and while I wish he would reconsider, do I care what he thinks about American cinema or television?  Hell no!  But while nobody I know seems to care what Canadians or Iranians think about their own music, our music, or any other American arts, we not only seem to care about what just 85 unknown foreigners think, but millions of us watch their annual awards show when they share their meaningless opinions with us.  That’s right: get 85 nameless, mostly freelance, liberal-leaning entertainment correspondents (not actors, directors, screenwriters, or other people actually involved in the making of American movies and television)—correspondents from independent foreign publications (not including major foreign publications like Le Monde or the Times of London whose correspondents were rejected for membership), and including members from Bangladesh and South Korea, let them nominate and vote on our movies and our TV, and you’ve got yourself the third highest-rated awards show in the US—the Golden Globes.

 

Look…I love the people, places, plants and pets of the world.  I really do.  I love the scenery of the Alps, the food of Asia and Latin America, the people of Australia, the oil of the Middle East, and most of the religions of India.  And it may surprise you to know that I actually do care about what foreigners think about the US, its people and its politics.  But I really don’t care beyond just a passing curiosity what they think of our music, movies and TV, just as I’m sure someone in a foreign country right now really doesn’t care what I and 84 other nameless and faceless people from a country other than theirs think about their music, movies and TV.

 

Thankfully, it seems that America is finally getting wise to the fact that the Golden Globes should actually be called the Golden Turds.  Apparently, the 2005 Golden Globes were watched by a massive 40% fewer people than in 2004.  That’s certainly a promising trend, but with the Globes still ranking among the top three awards programs on US television, I hope that by the time you finish reading/listening to today’s diatribe, you too will contribute to another massive slump in this year’s Golden Globe viewership so that the Golden Globes, as well as the Hollywood Foreign Press Corps, will be riding off into the sunset for good.

 

 

HOW TO FIX THE BROKEN DEATH PENALTY

 

In my last diatribe, the companion to this one, I talked about why I was a death penalty foe.  Basically, despite the rhetoric of its supporters, and even the temporary emotional “satisfaction” it gives even capitol punishment foes like me, the death penalty is useless.  It doesn’t deter future crime, it doesn’t bring about any closure, it doesn’t bring people back to life, it’s too easy on people who don’t deserve a “sleepy, painless death,” and worst of all it’s sometimes applied to innocent people.  But there’s a stumbling block in the way of doing what needs to be done and getting rid of the death penalty, and that’s what today’s diatribe is about.

 

Unfortunately, most death penalty opponents are bleeding-hearts whose arguments appeal to things like the industrialized world’s opposition to the death penalty and the attempt to frame murderers as victims by blaming genetics and bad upbringing for their behavior as adults.  I say “unfortunately” because in my opinion they’re missing the boat.  The real obstacle to abolishing the death penalty isn’t the fact that the industrialized countries of the world don’t have a good point and that we’re too “American” to understand it.  And it’s not the fact that we don’t understand the contributions genetics and psychology have made to understanding criminal motivation.  The real reason we still have the death penalty in this country is because there is not a suitable alternative punishment to execution for the worst of the worst human beings walking the planet, and that, is the fault of liberals—quite ironic, because Roman Catholics aside, they’re the most vociferous foes of capitol punishment.

 

Sadly, we live in a country where far too many people sentenced to life imprisonment, the next best alternative to capitol punishment, seem to be living the life of Riley behind bars, and getting even more attention and publicity incarcerated than they did before going into the big house.  Don’t believe me?  Take Eric Menendez, serving a life sentence for the murder of his parents along with his brother Lyle.  Eric, in addition to getting married to a woman he was allowed to correspond with and later meet in person while in the slammer, was recently also allowed to conduct a telephone interview with Entertainment Tonight about topics ranging from his relationship with his wife to the double murder of his parents.  Or how about Charles Manson?  Ole’ Chuck seems to be on TV every time you turn around, spewing his trademark insanity for everyone to hear—including the friends and families of his victims who, as long as he’s allowed to do so, will be haunted by this despicable human being.  And when does an anniversary of John Lennon’s death go by without another jailhouse interview with Mark David Chapman, the loony who blew John away to impress Jody Foster.  Just “Imagine” (pun intended) how Yoko Ono feels when occasionally throughout the rest of her life she flips through the channels on TV only to see her husband’s killer being interviewed yet again.  Even though I personally can’t stand Yoko Ono or her music one bit, I still think that even she deserves to know that the scumbag who wasted her hubby will never be seen or heard from again, and it’s sad to think that we live in a country where the only way to ensure that from happening is from killing him too.

 

These are just some of the famous cases we’re familiar with, but lord knows there’s a batch of others who are not as well known but treated just as nicely.  How many times do we hear about a murderer getting a degree behind bars that we of course are paying for, or like Eric Menendez getting married and carrying on correspondence friendships with pen pals.  And even worse, and probably the biggest fear of the friends and family members of murder victims, there are still stories of heinous murderers either being given sentences less than life because it was the next-best alternative in the absence of the death penalty, or released for some reason after a time spent in prison paying only a portion of their debt to society.  In a world—or in our case a country—where liberal activism has made all these things possible for people who should be kept in confinement for the rest of their lives, the death penalty starts to look more and more attractive to both victims of violent crime, their families, and even society at large.

 

But these criminals should not be pampered and afforded all kinds of special rights and privileges because it’s the only way to finally abolish the death penalty; criminals should not be pampered because they’re criminals.  Your life, liberty and ability to pursue happiness ends the second your cell door shuts behind you.

 

Aside from having the ability to communicate with his or her attorney to monitor any developments in their case, or the ability for a chaplain or even an inmate treatment monitor to occasionally visit to ensure our American prisons haven’t turned into Abu Graib, when someone is put away for life because they’ve murdered someone in cold blood and it’s a case where the death penalty has been spared, then society—including the inmate’s friends, family, and pen pals to be—should never see or hear from them again.  Ever.  That means no correspondence with brides-to-be, no interviews with 20/20 or Entertainment Tonight that force friends and families of victims to relive the crime, and no early releases.  And instead of worrying about how many rights the dregs of society should be afforded once they’re behind bars, liberals should spend their time working to ensure people accused of capitol offenses have the best legal representation they can possibly get, and trying to overturn the convictions of those they believe are wrongly incarcerated.  Then maybe they won’t feel so cruel when the folks in the big house don’t get to get married or be on TV anymore.  The ridiculously posh way we treat the most heinous criminals serving life sentences must be changed if we can ever hope to have a better alternative to the feel-good but ineffective and morally wrong death penalty.  Only then will the abolition of the death penalty have the chance of mustering the political support necessary to make it a reality, which would both ensure that families and friends of victims can rest in peace without resorting to execution, and most important of all, it will also stop once and for all the horrible, albeit rare practice of putting innocent people to death.

 

 

TODAY’S DIATRIBE: WHY THE DEATH PENALTY IS USELESS; NEXT DIATRIBE: HOW TO FIX IT.

 

This is two-part daily diatribe.  This one’s about the death penalty, and the next one will be what we need to do to fix the death penalty.

 

Well Tookie Williams, the co-founder of the notorious Crips street gang, was just put to death and his execution has put the death penalty back on the public’s collective radar screen.  I’ve got to admit it.  Anytime…ANYTIME I hear that a small child has been abducted, beaten, raped, tortured, and then killed, the first thing that comes to my mind is that the individual responsible for the crime should be killed—done away with—erased from the face of the Earth.  That individual adds nothing to American society or the world at large and really need not be here.  Really.

 

But soon, or sometimes not so soon, the initial emotional response of shock and rage wear off, and the realities of the death penalty and criminal justice in our society creep in.  The reality of the fact that we kill our most heinous criminals with more painlessness than the average law-abiding citizen experiences at the time of their own death, and with as much dignity as we afford our four-legged friends when they’re put to sleep.  The reality that the death penalty does not deter other capitol offenses from being committed.  The reality that neither the death penalty, nor any other form of punishment can actually bring back the dead or undo the psychological damage that was done to the victim before their murder.  The fact that even our most notorious killers receive publicity and an audience to tell their story to before they die.  The fact that even death sentences can be and sometimes are commuted, further traumatizing the friends and families of victims, and victims still living, because of their inability to experience closure to their pain.  And finally, the reality of the fact that sometimes innocent people are put to death because of human imperfection blended with the pursuit of revenge.

 

It’s these realities that make me a right brain death penalty advocate but a left brain death penalty foe.  And, at the risk of sounding like Slick-Willie himself, I side with my left brain because in issues of law and justice, crime and punishment, the influence of emotion has no place.

 

Now I want to take this opportunity to distinguish myself from other death penalty opponents who frequently argue that we should drop the death penalty because the rest of the civilized world has already done so.  While I’m not saying the experience and wisdom of others is to be ignored, the simple argument that “everyone else is doing it” has never had much influence on me.

 

I also want to separate myself from those who oppose the death penalty because they believe that anyone who kills must be mentally deranged, and who, whether genetically-predisposed or environmentally-influenced, is not ultimately to be blamed for his or her crime.  While either one or both of those forces may have played a role in the killer’s background, I still believe that even youngsters and certainly those in adulthood know the difference between right and wrong in spite of that background, and are capable of choosing between them.  And while the agency or free-will of the killer might excuse their genes or harsh upbringing from fault, it still doesn’t mean that the responsible party, the killer, should die for his or her crime.  If killing is wrong in the first place, and if a second killing will not right the wrong of the first or prevent future killings, then to kill as punishment is pointless.  That’s why even when we know with 100% certainty that an individual has committed a cold-blooded act that death penalty fans would deem worthy of punishing with execution, the death penalty should still not be imposed.

 

“But what about closure, Jason. Victims can’t rest until the killer is also killed.”  Really?  Ask the families of children lost in the Columbine massacre if their loss is any easier because the killers took their own lives after their rampage.  Thankfully, I haven’t personally experienced the loss of a loved one in a premeditated murder.  But if I were to lose one of the people most important to me in my life, I do know that killing the perpetrator, his entire family, his offspring, and anyone else won’t do a damn thing to make me feel any better about the loss.  When it comes to the death of a loved one, and especially a death by sadistic means, there will never be closure, at least for me.

 

There are many reasons why the death penalty should go the way of the dinosaurs, but the most important of all is the fact that occasionally innocent people are mistakenly put to death for crimes they didn’t commit.  That there are people who would support the death penalty even knowing that the occasional innocent individual would be executed is truly disturbing, but not as disturbing as the fact that American society as a whole continues to support a flawed practice that allows innocents, albeit rarely, to die.

 

It’s also interesting to note that many of the most staunch death penalty advocates are evangelical Christians, people who follow a man who taught forgiveness and to love one’s enemies.  But I always find it interesting when asked about forgiveness in the context of the death penalty, that many sound more like vengeful Muslims bent on eye-for-an-eye retribution characteristic of Mohammed instead of someone inspired by the turn-the-other-cheek, forgiving love of Christ.  And if they do try to use the rhetoric of forgiveness, they’ll usually say something like “I forgive him, but that doesn’t preclude us from giving him the chair.”  I’ve gotta say that that logic, no, that language bears no logic and makes no sense to me personally.  But I don’t identify myself as a Christian so I’ll leave it to actual Christians to reconcile their own beliefs and actions.

 

The real problem with scrapping the death penalty today is twofold: 1) most death penalty foes are bleeding hearts who lack the credibility to make a solid case for scrapping capitol punishment without sounding like they’re soft on crime; and 2) even the most heinous individuals serving life sentences (the punishment that death penalty foes would mete out to murderers in lieu of death) are living the life of Reily instead of experiencing a punishment that truly fits their crimes.  And these—these serious problems and roadblocks to the elimination of the useless death penalty—will be the subject of my next diatribe.

 

 

THE CHRISTIAN RIGHT: NOT AFRAID OF THE DEVIL, BUT GAY MARRIAGE….NOW THAT’S SCARY!!!

 

Recently it was rumored that Ford Motor Company might have withdrawn advertisements in gay publications because they were bent over the proverbial chair by the threat of boycott from the American Family Association.  Ford denies the charges and says it was other factors that led it to pull out of the gay publications, and apparently the publisher of the gay publications believes Ford.

 

But while Ford and other companies might have stood their ground this time around, it doesn’t change the fact that there are legions of homophobic bigots out there, usually evangelical Christians of the so-called “Christian Right,” hell bent on protecting you, me, and all other god-fearing heterosexuals from what they refer to as the “homosexual agenda.”  And their tactics include blackmailing corporations like Ford, Wells Fargo and Walt Disney into dropping what they call “gay friendly” corporate policies (the nerve of those companies!).

 

To hear the Christian right explain it, you’d think that the so-called “homosexual agenda” was something we should all be really worried about as if it were the homosexual equivalent of a worldwide Muslim caliphate, only with Harvey Feierstein as “Lord Queen” instead of the global Ayatollah.  It’s so frightening, so destructive, and so hideous that almost every homophobic Christian organization has as one of its key political aims to pass what they call “defense of marriage” legislation to, as they strangely assert, save real marriages (of course what they mean is heterosexual marriages) from gays getting married.

 

First let me say that I’m married, to a woman, and there are only two people that have anything whatsoever to do with the success or failure of my marriage and it’s not a gay married couple; the only two people who will determine whether or not my marriage is a success are my wife and I.  And it’s the same for every other straight marriage out there.

 

Second, I’ve known gays my whole life and the only homosexual agenda that I know of is making the world a better place by color coordinating everything, styling the hair of its people, and ensuring that our wardrobes are more fashionable.  If the radical right is worried about gays converting people to “its team,” then I think our homophobic friends doth project too much.  The only people I know of who jump through hoops of fire to try to convert people are not gays at all—they’re evangelical Christians!

 

But to be fair to the homophobic Christian extremists on the right, let’s examine the ways in which the radical right fears gays could possibly “harm” my marriage thereby making me and my marriage require the protection of evangelical Christians.

 

1) The Christian right thinks that gays want to convert us straights and our kids.  This is only a concern if it’s possible to convert someone from one orientation to another, and good news Christian right: it’s not!  The truth is that you’re not so much worried about gay conversion as you are about gay people already in your midst coming out of the closet; you don’t need to worry about gays on the outside of your congregations because they don’t want anything to do with you anyway.  And if you’re really as pissed about the public display of gay affection that you bitch about seeing at gay pride parades as you say you are, then stop going to the parades.  How hard is that?

2) Evangelical Christians fear that gays will get the same rights as married people.  Well, so what?  What do I care whether Adam and Steve have spousal privileges?  I don’t, and neither should anyone else.  If a company wants to offer spousal benefits to spouses, that’s the private matter of a privately held company. And contrary to the logic of people like the American Family Association or Focus on the Family, even if a privately-owned company like Ford or Disney does not offer benefits to gay spouses, it’s not going to make those affected any less gay.  And by the way: there is no moral or religious equivalence whatsoever between a company’s extension of benefits to gay spouses, and a company’s supporting of pro-choice causes.  Even if you’re anti-choice, you must admit that gay couples marrying aren’t killing even a possible human life, and in fact, they’re not even contributing to the abortion problem at all because they can’t conceive.  If anything, gays who want kids want to be able to adopt, which would actually help reduce abortions, but in a characteristically contradictory stance, most evangelical Christians oppose that too.

3) The Sodom and Gomorrah effect.  Just as Pat Robertson suggested that Hurricane Katrina and other natural disasters are at least in part brought on by the sinfulness of the people in the areas struck by them, many evangelicals believe that gays bring down the wrath of God on all of us, gay and straight alike.  Even post Katrina I heard many pastors on TV claiming that the hurricane hit when it did as God’s way of supernaturally preventing the gay “Southern Decadence” celebration from happening.  Well if that’s your fear, Christians, then I fear your faith may not be as strong as you claim it is.  If you actually read the story of Sodom and Gomorrah in the bible, you’ll see that God said he’d spare it for the sake of ten God-fearing people.  Just ten, no matter how many other angel rapists there are in the town.  (Remember that the threat of rape—and not just any rape but angel rape—was the straw that broke the camel’s back for S&G, not consensual homosexuality).  Heck, by that logic, simply placing groups of ten Christian human shields in geological and meteorological danger zones around the world should prevent any form of natural calamity from happening, and God knows that would still never actually stop natural disasters from happening. 

 

The bottom line is this: not only do gays pose ZERO threat to my marriage or anyone else’s (with the exception of gay closeted Republicans who married their fag hags, beards, window dressing, or whatever else you want to call them), but as far as I’m concerned, gays do just the opposite for me and my marriage.  Gays have played and still do play active roles in my life, my wife’s life, and our life together none of which we need to be defended from by Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson or any other bigot.  I would list their names here and describe how meaningful they’ve been to us as friends and acquaintances, but I thought I’d save them the dogmatic hatred that the mere knowledge that they’re gay would automatically bring down on them from idiots who think that all gays wear leather chaps to the grocery store and make out with their partners in front of pre schools.

 

So what the hell is wrong with a man marrying another man, or a woman marrying another woman?  And I’m actually serious here.  I’m not asking this rhetorically expecting the proverbial choir I’m preaching to to just respond with a “yeah!  What is wrong with that?!”  I’m actually asking a heartfelt question to those who really do believe that there’s some horrible evil being committed when two people of the same gender decide to get married.  So you think they’ll go to hell for it.  Then leave them the hell alone and let them go to hell—they ain’t takin’ you with ‘em, right?  That is, unless folks like James Dobson of Focus and the Family are strangely aroused by the whole man on man thing.  Maybe that’s why they’re so worried.  Some gay spell that charms bigots into switching teams, and whose casting power was conferred upon all gays by Satan himself.  Is it just that you don’t have good gay-dar and you’re afraid you might befriend one at the gym and accidentally end up in the shower with and be seen by one? Because god-forbid that would happen because we all know that gays attack unwitting naked straight men and force them to listen to club remixes of Ricky Martin as you towel each other off in the locker room.  Is that what you think is gonna happen?  Or maybe there was a “gay” chapter in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion that only evangelical Christians read that kind of spooked them.  Hello!  Not a factual book!

 

Look.  Gays are probably right there in your life already, Christian right…they’re arranging your furniture and picking out colors for your foyer, they’re styling your hair, and they’re buying lots of the stuff your business sells because as a demographic, gays are some of the most wealthy, economically secure folks around.  Look—take a page out of the playbook of Mormon-owned businesses for a second—Mormon’s don’t condone pornography, gambling or drinking alcohol.  But they know that other non-Mormons will always do those sinful things (and in large numbers), and that you can make a lot of money off the sinners without being corrupted by them.  And by the way, you’ll also have a better chance at winning the sinners over to your side if you’re actually nice to them instead of doing everything you can think of to piss them off.

 

 

A BOWL GAME FOR EVERY TEAM: HAVE LIBERALS TAKEN OVER COLLEGE FOOTBALL?

 

When I was a kid the only college bowl games I could remember were the Rose Bowl (because of the damn parade), the Sugar Bowl, the Gator Bowl, the Orange Bowl, the Citrus Bowl, the Sun Bowl, and I vaguely remember a Peach Bowl too.  And that was about it.  They were all invitation-only games, they all happened around New Years, they all featured the best teams in college football, and they all shared their names with the name of the facility in which the game was played (i.e., the Rose Bowl was played in the Rose Bowl, the Sun Bowl was played in the Sun Bowl, etc.).

 

But then things started to change.  The first thing that happened is that big companies saw an opportunity to get some advertising exposure by underwriting and sponsoring the bowl games, and in return for their big bucks they got their names in the name of the bowl game itself…before the name of the bowl game.  I didn’t have a huge problem with that because as long as they were still preserving the name of the heritage bowl game, the sponsors needed to get their money’s worth.

 

Pretty soon, though, a few more things started to change that I wasn’t so thrilled about.  Once companies saw other companies getting some good exposure by sponsoring bowl games they wanted in on the action too.  But there was a problem: there were only a handful of bowl games, and the only way for everyone to be able to play in the sandbox was to make the sandbox bigger.  So here came the additional bowl games, and at a rate so fast that it didn’t matter whether or not there was a stadium with a cool “Bowl” name to play it in, so you had games like the Silver Bowl in Las Vegas played in Sam Boyd Stadium, and San Francisco’s Emerald Bowl played in SBC Park (a baseball stadium!).  And soon, I guess the bowl types just gave up on trying to come up with clever names unique to the city or community where the game was played.  Instead, as long as the cash was flowing in, they just dispensed with them entirely in some cases, going instead with the very generic, and very uncreative, “sponsor name”-BOWL.

 

So today, not only do we have 28 bowl games and counting, but 22 of those bear a corporate sponsor’s name, and eight of those bear only the name of the sponsor.  But hey!  Who cares when you’re talking about quality football teams with great records, right?  Well that would assume that the teams that populate modern-day bowl games are quality teams with great records, and unfortunately, someone making that assumption would be sorely off the mark.  In 2005, for example, of the 56 teams playing in the 28 bowl games, 15 were just two losses away from losing seasons, and 12 others were barely one game over 500.

 

Look.  The way I see it, at least half of the teams playing in bowl games this year have no business being in intra-squad scrimmages much less bowl games.  But I’m also a good capitalist and if companies are dumb enough to sponsor crappy teams in crappy bowls, then I for one am not going to get in their way.  In fact, why stop at 28 bowl games?  Since there doesn’t seem to be any stopping the proliferation of bowl games featuring mediocre teams with mediocre records, I say, “keep on bowling!”  And since it seems like college football is getting touchy-feely and trying to make sure there’ a bowl game for every team so no one feels left out, I just have one request.  Let’s make sure that just as there’s a championship bowl game (like this year’s Rose Bowl), that there’s also a bowl game for the worst two teams in college football, and that it be called, appropriately, the toilet bowl.

 

 

MEMO TO LIBERAL SCROOGES…MAKE LIKE FROSTY AND CHILL OUT ON THE CAPITOL “CHRISTMAS” TREE!        

 

According to the History Channel, and frankly I have no reason to doubt them, the whole Christmas tree thing started with the ancient Egyptians.  They worshipped the sun god “Ra,” and since winter with its shorter days cramped Ra’s style, they’d celebrate the winter solstice.  The winter solstice, which falls on the 21st or 22nd of December, because it was the shortest day of the year and after the solstice, the days got longer and Ra started to recover from his winter illness.  And what better way to celebrate Ra’s recovery than to decorate their homes with green palm leaves to celebrate the victory of life over death.

 

Later, the good ole Romans had their own god—this time Saturn, the god of agriculture (which of course depends pretty heavily on the Sun)—and they too celebrated the winter solstice because they knew that soon thereafter, farms and orchards would be green and fruitful.  And similar to the Egyptians, they decorated their homes and temples with evergreen boughs to mark the occasion.

 

But enough about Egyptians and Romans…what about the Christmas tree?  As far as the first Christian incarnation of an actual “Christmas” tree, the History Channel says that’s the doing of the Germans in the 1500s, when devout Christians were said to have brought decorated trees into their homes.  Even legend has it that Martin Luther himself (you know, the man responsible for the Protestant Reformation) was one of the first to actually decorate a tree to celebrate Christmas.

 

But whatever the origin of the “Christmas” tree (and please note my use of quotation marks to indicate my sarcastic use of the word here), one thing is for sure: a pine tree (or any other tree, real or fake) adorned with flashing lights, ornaments, and a star on the top with presents underneath has as much to do with the birth of Christ as the man on the moon.

 

But that’s sure not gonna stop the rabid liberals of ACLU ilk from at best protesting and at worst suing to stop the beautiful New Mexico tree slated to be erected in front of the US Capitol Building (and other trees like it in or in front of other city, state, county and federal government buildings all across the US) from being called a “Christmas Tree” instead of the more politically-correct and less-offensive “Holiday Tree.”  Stupidly these fools actually think that merely calling the thing a Christmas tree (since no matter what you call it it’s still gonna look the same in the end) is a form of government sanctioned religion.

 

Hey libs…make like a Christmas tree and lighten up!  Christmas trees are just one of many Christmas season things that bear the name Christmas but have nothing to do with Christianity whatsoever!  I mean think about it.  Ask anyone—and especially kids—to do a word association with Christmas and they’ll rattle off things like presents, shopping, Santa Claus, jingle bells, reindeer, Christmas trees, stockings hung by the chimney with care, and Christmas parties.  Not only is Jesus probably not on the list, and not only do these things have nothing at all to do with Jesus or his birth or why Christians believe he’s important (son of God, everlasting life, etc.), but these things would probably revolt Jesus—the very guy whose birth we’re supposed to be celebrating!

 

And just like the story about where the tradition of a Christmas tree came from, there are also numerous theories about how we ended up with December 25th as the date on which Christmas is celebrated.  But one thing is almost unanimously agreed upon: the first Christmas, the birth of Jesus, did not happen on December 25th.  But That’s OK, celebrants say, because what’s important is that on Christmas we celebrate the birth of the man Christians believe is the savior, not the exact date on which he was supposed to have been born.  But that’s another problem: we don’t celebrate the man.  OK, maybe you go to church and sing a hymn.  But show me the person who spends as much time meditating on the mystery of Jesus’ virgin birth, his role in the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, or his death and resurrection, as they do making their shopping list, checking it twice, shopping for everything on the list, and then complaining when they don’t get what they want in their stocking, and I’ll show you the wedding photo of the Loch Ness Monster marrying Bigfoot.

 

So to all the libs out there worried that the capitol Christmas tree is a tool of evangelism for Christianity, relax, and remember two important things: 1) if the capitol Christmas tree is a tool of evangelism, then it’s an equal opportunity evangelizer since it’s stumping (pun intended) for the gods Saturn and Ra too; and 2) Christmas is a cultural holiday in the US, not a religious one.  If you’re really worried that a tree is an endorsement of Christmas, just turn on a television, open up a newspaper, or visit a mall to remind yourself that Christmas isn’t a religious holiday anymore nor has it been for quite some time.  Even people who call themselves Christians and celebrate “Christmas” don’t see the inside of a church but once or maybe twice a year, and their celebrations of Christmas are more about materialistic indulgences (the shopping), gluttony (the feasts, parties and gingerbread), and sloth (taking time off work to shop and eat) than a celebration of thanks for the birth of their savior.  So if anyone has a right to be pissed at this time of year, it’s not a bunch of whiny lefties with nothing better to waste their time on—it’s Jesus himself!

 

The bottom line is this: instead of whining, protesting, suing and in general just getting ticked off about things like Christmas trees and the fact that Christmas is an officially-observed holiday by government entities, the rabid, radical non-Christians most ticked off about things like Christmas trees should make like Frosty the Snowman (another icon of Christmas that has squat to do with Christ) and chill out!  Let the modern-day Christians do their modern-day Christian thing, and if you really want to be ticked off about something and you want to get judgmental about it (which, incidentally, real Christians would not do), then protest the playing of Jose Feliciano’s “Feliz Navidad” every five minutes.

 

 

THE MOST UN-REALISTIC SHOWS ON TV...REALITY SHOWS

 

Although most people credit Mark Burnett and his “Survivor” with the creation of reality TV, I personally give credit to MTV’s “The Real World” as the first show in the category of what people today call “reality TV.”  But while people may not be able to agree on who gets the Emmy for “first reality show ever known to man,” we should at least be able to agree on one thing—the term “reality show” is an oxymoron at best, and at worst, the “reality show” is utterly UN-realistic.

 

First clue?  Everyone’s hot…and I mean EVERYONE.  OK I know what you’re saying, Donald Trump is hideous by any standard and I’ll grant you that one.  But Donald aside, everyone’s hot!  The hosts, the contestants, the passers-by on the street (or the passers by on the beach where shows are frequently shot because most people who go to the beach are hot)…they’re all smokin’…fine…H-O freakin’ T.

 

“But Jason,” you’re saying, “other than the whole ‘hot’ thing, reality shows are sooo REALISTIC!”  Of course they are!  I mean, who doesn’t live with a bevy of beautiful bisexual women in a penthouse suite atop the Palms Hotel and Casino where the basic necessities of life are all taken care of?  Who doesn’t get stranded on an island where all of the chicks (except the token fat old lady) look fantastic in bikinis?  Who doesn’t live communally atop Trump Tower as you compete with a team against another team for an executive position within the Trump organization?  And finally, who doesn’t get followed around by cameras, 24/7, having your every move, gesture and word recorded, and virtually removing the word “privacy” from your functional vocabulary?

 

Come the heck on!  If that’s reality, then my name is Jeff Probst and your name is Omarosa.  Everybody knows…scratch that…everyone should know, that in the real world (not on MTV’s “The Real World”), you find roommates by placing an ad for people with similar living habits—not by hiring a casting director who wants to create as much chaos, drama and sexual tension as is humanly possible; that in the real world you get a job by submitting an application and interviewing with the boss, not by being hot, feisty, and…well…HOT; and most importantly, in the real world, you get fired from a job when you act like an ass to your coworkers, and you get kicked out of your apartment when you’re a dick to your roomies—you do not get rewarded for your being an ass/dick/(insert your favorite vulgar body part here) by being allowed to stay in your job and/or apartment because it’s good for ratings.

 

Now by now you’re probably thinking that I must hate these so-called “reality shows” and that I must have a beef with the genre. But if you are, you’re wrong.  I’m actually an admitted reality show bitch, needing my weekly fix of both Apprentices, Extreme Makeover Home Edition, and any show involving the temporary swapping of spouses and the rearing of disobedient brats.  Because while these shows may not be as “realistic” as the name “reality show” would indicate, they still enable me to experience the full range of human emotions without bad things happening to me personally.  Yes, from the comfort of my living room recliner, I can experience the emotional highs of watching a deserving family have their home rebuilt and redecorated, and I can also be filled with fear…not by watching a documentary about terrorism, but by watching shows like Nanny 911 where families who should never have been allowed to breed have not only spawned, but spawned offspring who make the evil doll Chucky look like McCauley Culkin on valium.

 

So watch and enjoy these “shows,” but let’s be real and not call them “reality shows.”  Let’s call them what they really are… “TV crack.”

 

 

MEET THE DICTATOR WHO WANTS TO TAKE CONTROL OVER INTERNET ADDRESSING AWAY FROM THE UNITED STATES!

 

Archbishop Desmond Tutu has called him a cartoon figure of the archetypal African dictator.  Investors Business Daily calls him “the most visible manifestation of the tyranny and corruption that sustains misery through much of Africa.”  He’s a Marxist, a bigamist, and his repressive style of campaigning and governing basically make him a dictator too.  And now, the illustrious Robert Mugabe, President of Zimbabwe, is leading the fight to take control of the Internet’s governing agency away from the US.

 

Are you freakin’ kidding me?  Robert Mugabe?  Was everyone else in the anti-US camp at the recent UN technology summit asleep when the issue of Internet addressing came up?  Were they at a special drum circle for third-world Marxist dictators that Robert wasn’t invited to?  Or was it something far worse…something far more sinister…did the so-called “leaders” of the UN’s America-hating banana republics actually want Robert Mugabe making their case because they thought he’d do the best job at it?  Was he the best they could do?

 

I’d like to give a few pieces of advice to the America-hating banana republics of the world (might want to pay attention here Fidel, Bashar, Hugo, Robert, Muumar, and the rest of you democratically-challenged fascists):

 

First, pick a better spokesperson!  Mugabe’s the kind of guy that I don’t even need to analyze what he does to know that I want to be doing the exact opposite of what he’ doing.  In other words, if Robert’s turning left, I’m turning right, if he’s white, I’m black, and if Robert says po-TAE-toe, I’m saying po-TAH-toe (even though it goes against my every instinct to say it that way because everyone knows it’s really po-TAE-toe).  In fact, if Robbie Mugabe’s running away from the cliff’s edge, I’d actually be inclined to run off the edge of the cliff just because it’s not what Mugabe decided to do. That’s the kind of length I and other clear-thinking lovers of all things American would go to just to be anywhere you and dictators like you are not.

 

My next piece of advice for you modern-day Stalins: shut the hell up about anything that affects any-one but the poor, leadership-deprived human souls with the misfortune of living under your rule.  (And if those poor souls had their way you should probably shut up about anything involving them too.)  See, there are actually many good reasons for everyone—both in your country and abroad—to hate you, and those reasons can accurately be summed up in one overarching reason: you govern like that which emerges from beneath a horse’s tail.  (by the way that’s a euphemism for crap if you were struggling with the description).  That’s right.  There’s a reason why your countries are in sad states of affairs, and it’s not the fault of America and the democracies of the world—it’s the fault of poor leadership (in other words it’s your fault), and we don’t need your asinine ideas to ruin miserably important global resources like the Internet.

 

And one final piece of advice for the world’s remaining brutal dictators: don’t rule out suicide.  Yes, I encourage you to strongly and carefully consider what would indeed be the best course of action for you and the people of your country—and I don’t mean international control of the Internet…I mean you making a date with a warm bath and a freshly-sharpened razor.  See, assassination is messy and risks the lives of our commandos, and it never gets good press around the world because people are always predisposed to hate the powerful.  And your continued lives do nothing but ruin the lives of your people, and annoy and sadden people throughout the rest of the world.  So do the world and your people a favor and google the lyrics to the theme song from the TV show “MASH,” and give the chorus some serious thought.

 

Now although it’s quite unthinkable, there might actually be an open-minded soul out there who gives someone like Robert Mugabe the benefit of the doubt, and that rare person might remind us that Mugabe helped gain independence for his country and was always an opponent of apartheid.  That person might also remind us that Zimbabwe has one of the highest literacy rates in Africa because Mugabe was once a teacher.  Great—that just means that the country with the highest AIDS rate in the world (almost a fourth of the adult population) will be able to read the directions on their prescription medication—that’s if they’re even able to afford it in a country with 70% unemployment, and where the average life expectancy is 38 for women and 40 for men.  Look—even Jeffrey Dahmer gave his mom birthday cards and even Osama bin Laden loves his wives.  But one or two good deeds don’t forgive multiple grave ones.

 

The bottom line for me is this: I don’t want Robert Mugabe or any other of his Stalinist third-world cronies installing my worst enemy’s VCR, much less dispensing advice on Internet protocols or doing anything else which affects my life in even the most minimal way.  So leave Internet naming governance to the people who founded it, and we’ll happily leave you to the pathetic little regimes you falsely claim to legitimately govern.

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