Brb. Guinness.

In Ireland, enjoying the people. The greatest part about traveling alone is that you *have* to make friends. And thanks the FSM, but it's easy as sin in this nation. I mean, they're not as pretty as in Spain, but damn are they friendly.

Holy Crap

So I've been accepted into grad school. I'm slightly buzzed, not from any substance, but from the simple pleasure of having about a decade of work pay off. My God, I can change the world if I work hard enough. I can do something *good* and it might matter to more then those I interact with directly. I'll be *paid* to meddle with the basic essance of life, and perhaps even change the way we inteact with the environment on the most basic level.

I mean, yeah, am I making too much of this? Probably, but who cares? I'm a *scientist* now baby! We're supposed to dream big.

Happy September 11th.

So, it's the end of the working day, there's rain outside, and the subway feels a little more somber then usual. I didn't see anyone crying, and besides a terribly deep urge to drink copious amounts of hard liquor, I don't think I'm as badly effected as I was last year, or the year before that.

So I guess that is what this anniversary will become for New Yorkers of my generation; a morning when everyone's memories of the towers become somewhat clearer. A day when everyone speaks a little less, but has a little more to say. An evening when glasses drain a little quicker, and the table seems somehow incomplete. A night when the emotions for what was lost cuts even deeper, and the anger at the murderers feels even more bitter.

On that cheery note, I'd like to add that I happy that kids won't remember this day as the Day The Towers Fell, but rather the September 11th National Day of Service and Remembrance. It's what we should have done in the first place. We should have rebuilt it; taller and sturdier then before. We should have driven ourselves to surpass our wildest dreams, so as to make the ranting and conspiracies of those jealous, obscene little men so much filthy bile in the eyes of world. We had the money and the technology to change the world for the better, the mandate of every country on earth to Make Things Right and we had the destroyed potential of three thousand lives to live up to.

But instead we remembered only the smoke, the terror and the anger of that day, and it's driven us all insane. We've been mad - as a nation - for 8 years, and while we're slowly coming back to sanity, we're still divided, still enraged, still trembling in fear at the eyes that peer at us from their gloomy cover of superstitious ignorance and fundamentalist hatred.

We need to escape that state of mind. We need to build, because bombs and bullets do nothing but turn civilizations into rubble. They are good for creating an empire, but what lands could we conquer that might improve our nation? Our only means of expansion lies upwards, our only means of improvement are in our labs, schoolrooms and homes. The more money and willpower we waste on brushfire wars, the less we have to spend on efforts that will make our nation great again. We need dreams and ambitions that build upon our national foundations of advancement through self-improvement; elevating ourselves through the destruction of others only warps our core into the same dark and inhuman monsters we fought almost 70 years past.

But I don't know if we are ready for such thoughts yet. Part of our country is still fixated on purging any perceived weakness that might allow the terrorists access to their sleepy hometowns and gated communities. "Weaknesses" that include the philosophy of battling confusion with reason, disagreement with conversation, and hatred with mediation.

After all, who needs to actually fix things when we can distract ourselves by labeling liberals as the offending "other"; that villainous parasite who can leave no baby unaborted, no grandmother unpoisoned, and no wallet unplundered. Who needs to actually help our sick and dying fellow citizens, when we have mobs storming town halls, panicked over the thought that people are even *expressing* an opinion contrary to their. Why should we address our still-ailing economy when we can distract ourselves with calls for revenge, and justice for imagined slights, slights which must be increased and indulged with every retelling to satisfy some perverted urge to be the repressed majority, thus excusing any actions taken to achieve "liberation".

Fucking hell, now I'm ranting and angry. Perfect drinking mood for mid-September, on the anniversary of when Everything Went To Shit.

WHERE IS YOUR INTELLIGENT DESIGNER NAO!?!?!

Saw this little pearl on Reddit, and had the following reaction:

So, let me get this straight: A bug crawls into the gills and throttles the tongue until it falls off. It then hooks itself onto the remains of the tongue's muscles, and spends the rest of it's life shitting down the fish's throat, with brief interludes of ejaculating/ovulating into the fish's mouth so they can spread more of these little horrors. Can someone now please explain to me that God is an intelligent designer, and he is also just and loving to his creations?

Re: THE MSM IS SILENCING CONSERVATIVES!

Lately, I've heard a lot of complaints about how the "MSM" and "liberal media" are refusing to acknowledge the "very real" upwelling of anger in America against health care reform. Leaving aside the fact that over half the protests out there are the result of Astroturfing, I feel nothing but approval and solidarity when a journalist takes a few seconds to speak against the Hobbesian mobs.

Journalists are obligated to accurately report on an event; they are not obligated to support or denounce it. And while editorialization can be taken to extremes (i.e. Keith Olbermann), as long as the opinions are deeply respectful of and rooted in reality, it remains in the realm of journalism. However, once facts are subverted by ideology, and opinion is disconnected from reality, then we move into the realm of propaganda (i.e. Fox News, Limbaugh). Not to follow this tangent too far, but Hunter S. Thompson is required reading to truly appreciate the fine line between journalism and ideological fantasy.

Anyway, the main point is that telling someone "You're wrong, and here's why" is not suppressing free speech. That's a conversation between equals. Suppression of free speech is when someone says "You're wrong, and you should not be allowed to voice your opinion". Conversely, opining that someone will bankrupt the country or destroy the free market is free speech, but accusing them of being a “treasonous nigger” is hate speech and calling for their immediate execution would be an example of "fighting words". Neither of these types of speech are protected under the 1st Amendment.

The Founders were big on debate, and they were fully aware that a conversation among strong wills with differing opinions frequently became heated. However, they recognized - and the Supreme Court has since maintained - that some speech isn't aimed at changing opinions or advancing ideas, but rather poisoning the entire conversation. When the conversation dies, the suspicion arises, the differences between factions become more bitter, and democracy dies.

Furthermore, even when the deathers, birthers and other crazies have danced upon the thin line between free-speech and attempting to incite a riot, have they been silenced? During the Bush years, when liberals and progressives marched, we were labeled traitors and collaborators, more willing to cooperate with some vague “enemy” then march in unthinking lockstep with the GOP. When we called for an investigation of Bush’s lies over WMD and torture, we were allowed airtime on some channels, but any attempt to insert these protests into Republican rallies universally resulted in ejection. During the RNC in New York, peaceful protestors were beaten and arrested after plainclothes cops started throwing things at the riot police, in order to excuse an overwhelming response. Set against this backdrop, I have to ask conservatives; how can you possibly think that *you* are being silenced?

Are we banning you from screaming incendiary remarks at otherwise peaceful and useful town halls?

Are we using cops to arrest you, even when you show up at demonstrations with fully automatic weapons, and claim it’s ‘for protection’ from unarmed liberal demonstrators?

Are we in any way limiting your freedoms, save by stating - quite rationally - that accusing progressives of using living wills as precursors to 'death panels' is unhelpful?

Are we denying you free speech when we say that that labeling an educational encouragement from the presidential level as 'socialist indoctrination' constitutes fear-mongering?

Are we doing anything but stating the truth when we say conservatives are not fully aware of the situation when they claim fear of ‘government rationing’, when insurance companies regularly rescind people whom they deem as no longer profitable?

Progressives are depressed because it's not possible to work with someone who is not interested in conversation, but confrontation. We’re scared because there are screaming mobs calling our political view treason, and traitors deserve death. We’re angry because we believe in democracy, but whenever we try to exercise it, the other side starts talking about succession and violence. We’re confused because we’re living in a country where one side of the aisle thinks that freedom of speech means they get to talk, we get to listen, and any attempt at conversation is a violation of their natural, eternal and divinely mandated supremacy. We're nihilistic because a significant part of our country is not bound by logic, is unaffected by cognitive dissonance, and does not acknowledge history, evidence or causality.

How can we believe in any future for this country, when the emerging base of the Republican Party believes that Fascism is Communism, Education causes Ignorance, and Civil Rights means Slavery?

Why is this still an issue?

You know, I've been following the various personalities from the right commenting on the death of Sen. Kennedy, and I just wanted to make sure that I was able to voice my support:

May God have mercy on this brutish, evil man. How could anyone possibly bring themselves to respect a man who was a driving force behind such insidiously liberal agendas like forcing honest American businessmen to pay their ingracious workers adequate wages. Thank God Almighty that we’ve been able to slow that down, those working class people might be able to afford something besides Wal-Mart and McDonalds if they were paid more. For Jesus’s sake people, they might be able to afford cocaine, or healthcare!

Oh, and speaking of healthcare, there’s another thing Kennedy almost ruined! I mean, if he’d had his way back in the 60’s, and again in the 90’s, we’d be on Communist Health Care! It would have destroyed our country if we even came close to that; after all, to pay for such a thing, we’d either have to stop going to war so often, or maybe raise taxes! How can they raise taxes a few percent, when we have so little left after using 20-40% of our income to pay our good capitalist American health insurance companies. That evil man from Massachusetts obviously didn’t understand the American people. I am so glad he’s dead.

He was such a hateful bigot that he used the entire federal government to target blacks and other minorities under the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the even more radical Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1982! How could any but the most evil of men support such a thing? If he'd only been like Strom Thurmond or Trent Lott, both of whom knew that the best way to ensure racial equality was to separate ethnic groups, so they wouldn't fight or anything.

And of course, since he never did anything good with his life, we need to focus on his brutal, completely purposeful slaying of someone we wouldn't give a hoot about (and would probably vilify if she was alive, due to her associating with such an arch-socialist), except that she was killed by a liberal, and thus we need to talk about her constantly, 40 years later.

You silly liberals, how can you say he's so great? How can you call him a hero when he was born into the most privileged family in the nation? While most sons of rich families were doing good wholesome things like spreading their parent’s wealth around (like the Gipper would have wanted) by buying American boats and eventually losing their parent’s fortunes to good honest American loan sharks, he and his brothers were associating with evil communists, like that race-baiting “Reverend” Martin Luther Jr. (who couldn’t have had a Doctorate, they don’t give them to commies. Unless, of course those pinkos want to become latte-sipping, elitist professors) and we all know that “Reverend” Luther knew that Islamofacist terrorist Malcom X, so that means that the Kennedy was a terrorist sympathizer with secret ties to Osama Bin Laden back in the 60’s! Kennedy did WTC!!11eleventyone!

…Whew, excuse me, it’s just that he just ticks me off so when I hear that man called such a hero, when real heroes, like both Bush 41 and Bush 43, who pulled themselves up by their own bootstraps, and did great things for this nation, like helping to destroy Big Government by forcing to it deal with crippling national debt. Go W!

Still, I'm going to show that I'm a good person by saying I'll pray for his blackened soul, and I hope God does what I want Him to do when He judges this terrible sinner in a just and merciful manner by sending him to Hell.



*Sigh*… Obviously, the above is bitter, bitter sarcasm, but the terrible thing is that so many people seem to think that this intensely flawed yet idealistic man is somehow on par with Gobbels or Stalin. Yes, he used his connections to reduce his punishment in the Chappaquiddick Incident, but compare his actions, and the legacy that he and his brothers left, to that of any other American brahmins (i.e. Bush, Rockefeller, etc) and you'll find that Teddy, Jack and Bobbie were some of the most dedicated servants of American ideals that this country has ever encountered.

This man changed the nation for the better. He was deeply flawed, but he did more with his life then nearly any other senator I could name. He fought hard, lived long and left the world a better place then he found it. May we all be so lucky.

Things that have popped into my brain recently.

Fairy Tales for Disturbed Children:

- The Boy Who Cried "Wolf" Due to an Unfortunate Case of Tourettes Syndrome.
- The Three Little Pigs Who Lived Quite Peacefully and the Wolf with the Straw-Counting Compulsion.
- Jack and The Beanstalk and His Ongoing Issues with Pseudologia fantastica.
- Cinderella and the Electra Complex.
- Beauty and the Furry Convention.


Comics for Emerging Teens:

Young Wonder Woman vs Menarche the Terrible
Can 12-year-old Wonder Woman stop the oncoming assault of Menarche the Terrible and her Planetary Mental Suppressor device?

Mr Fantastic vs the Hot Math Teacher
How can Mr Fantastic escape Ms. A. Trois' Blackboard of Embarrassment when he's lost his ability to bend?


/b/

"I was dropping F-bombs like my mouth was Henry Kissinger and ____'s ears were an unsuspecting Cambodia."