Thinking Unenslaved

ooops. my bad. that was SOTU. (the link is to the full SOTU text as posted by Think Progress)

{by the by, some of the “fun” in this post is in the image mouseovers. just sayin’….}

indeed. the last-and-final SOTU by Preznut Chimperator was yet another exercise in “Shut The Fuck Up, Chimpy”, flavored overmuch by the inherent sense of melancholy and dread that accompanies unbiased critical thinking as applied to careful consideration upon the actual state of the Union. in my humble opinion, it really couldn’t have been:

1. more depressing
2. more predictable
3. more embarrassing
4. more unremarkable

probably the most telling synopsis of this SOTU, as with any other, is the US Presidential Speeches Tag Cloud. i have this separately bookmarked in my browsers, because it encompasses all major presidential speeches, not just the SOTU/STFUs, and is a simple way to compare the focus of past speeches, and past presidents.

as usual, Think Progress has a great series of rebuttals to assertions and declarations made in this most recent SOTU. they even went so far as to provide separate tags for two different forms of capitalization: State of the Union and State Of The Union. either way you do it, the posts there are, as usual, a great window into how stupid he is.

personally, i think his opening lines were the most telling (and thus ensues the quotational cherry-picking!):

Seven years have passed since I first stood before you at this rostrum. In that time, our country has been tested in ways none of us could have imagined.

yeah, no shit, Chimpy. first of all, it’s really uncool to rub in the fact that it’s been SEVEN FECKING YEARS since you stole the preznutty. and “tested in ways none of us could have imagined” means far more to the average, every-day American than a coked-up fuckwit like you can likely fathom.

All of us were sent to Washington to carry out the people’s business. That is the purpose of this body. It is the meaning of our oath. And it remains our charge to keep.

again, no shit. it’s been SEVEN FECKING YEARS, moron. when exactly the fuck are you going to start carrying out the people’s business? ALL the people’s business. oh. never? yeah, go fig.

The actions of the 110th Congress…

now, just stop right there!

…will affect the security and prosperity of our Nation long after this session has ended.

i said, stop. gah. pinhead. yes they will, but only because they’re having to hop around cleaning up everything you’ve thrown your fetid chimpanzee feces at for the past SEVEN FECKING YEARS. do you seriously not realize that even your own party hates you? pfft.

most of us know better. even the lady with almost as much corporate baggage as you have knows better. STFU, Chimpy.

In the work ahead, we must be guided by the philosophy that made our Nation great.

exactly. thus, presuming a majority of the people vote for a Democrat for preznut, we’ll start getting better guidance in about a year.

In the long run, Americans can be confident about our economic growth.

“for the war machine and major corporations”

We have other work to do on taxes. Unless the Congress acts, most of the tax relief we have delivered over the past 7 years will be taken away. Some in Washington argue that letting tax relief expire is not a tax increase. Try explaining that to 116 million American taxpayers who would see their taxes rise by an average of $1,800. Others have said they would personally be happy to pay higher taxes. I welcome their enthusiasm, and I am pleased to report that the IRS accepts both checks and money orders.

oh, hah-hah-hah. very funny. your speech writer obviously crafted that little gem while snuggling with Jonah Goldberg in his mother’s basement. i’ll give you this, little man. you did a hell of a job reading through the cheetoh stains. anyway, STFU, Chimpy. ignorant bastard. not even “Uncle Ben” there seems to agree with you.

The people’s trust in their Government is undermined by congressional earmarks….

while that statement isn’t necessarily untrue, it misses the larger point that people’s trust in their government is undermined by the ineffectual and often embarrassing “leadership” of a “man” who is only marginally capable of communicating his own inadequacy. look, Chimpy, the idiots on the left there are the only ones who are happy with you, and they’re only happy with you when you’re not around.

Our shared responsibilities extend beyond matters of taxes and spending.

holy shit, Chimpy. it only took you SEVEN FECKING YEARS to figure that out. oh, wait. my bad. you were already hip to the “war” and “hypocrisy” squares.

The No Child Left Behind Act is a bipartisan achievement. It is succeeding. And we owe it to America’s children, their parents, and their teachers to strengthen this good law.

this, coming from The Chimpanzee Who Should Have Been Left Behind. i have yet to meet an education professional who has positive things to say about No Child Left Behind. it’s not a good law, Chimpy, and your opinion on the issue, my brave little below-average student, hardly matters.

{….skipping a whole bunch of shit because i have responsibilities….}

One of the most important tools we can give them is the ability to monitor terrorist communications. To protect America, we need to know who the terrorists are talking to, what they are saying, and what they are planning.

i was waiting for that. it wouldn’t have been a genuine Boosh Speech without a paragraph or two of fear-mongering.

America is leading the fight against global hunger.

indeed, eradicating those who follow the path of Islam, the most populous religion in the world, will certainly help make more food available for others.

America is leading the fight against disease.

except where it came to electing presidents over the past two elections, anyway.

America is a force for hope in the world because we are a compassionate people, and some of the most compassionate Americans are those who have stepped forward to protect us.

maybe it’s just a product of my own public schooling, but i didn’t think the word “compassion” was spelled I·N·V·A·S·I·O·N. or O·I·L. let alone G·R·E·E·D.

The secret of our strength, the miracle of America, is that our greatness lies not in our Government, but in the spirit and determination of our people.

again, a bit of truth shines out at the end. we’ll see how your kind fares in November. in the meantime, STFU, Chimpy.

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photo credits (in order of appearance): Tim Sloan/Pool/Reuters, AFP/Pool/Tim Sloan, AFP/Mandel Ngan, Jim Young/Reuters, Larry Downing/Reuters, Tim Sloan/Pool/Reuters, AFP/File/Mandel Ngan

(as in “soon”, as in “starting with the next post”), i will be using some different sources of “snarkography” for my posts. while this is not exactly momentous or anything, i have never really been thrilled with the size of images provided on Yahoo! news, nor with the limited selection. so, i’m no longer limiting myself.

okay, that was highly informative, i’m sure. carry on!

we are back from the frozen wastelands of slightly-north-of-here. despite being this far north (relative to the residences of many of my readers), this was our first “truly white” Christmas in several years. yeah, yeah, yeah…there’s been snow on the ground the last few years…snow like somebody went and opened a fifty-pound bag of flour over every square mile. this year, there were actually a few inches of sun-and-wind-skinned snow setting, and some appreciable drifts courtesy of the wind.

it was an early Christmas this year, thanks once again to the sisters’ conflicting work schedules. one of my brothers-in-law got half the family sick because of something he brought along with him after having gotten it from one of his kids. so our short, early Christmas rapidly became a care center for the stricken: my other brother-in-law, my son, and both of my parents-in-law. i knock on wood several times a day.

i am trying to pump out the blog transfer for the otherwhirled and synthaetica, but i have experienced a wordpress import problem that may ultimately require me to do the import directly from the database. in fact, i should probably just do that and scrub the support ticket. it’s been a while since i did something completely databasey, anyway.

and, for what it’s worth, i know this will eventually come up in searches for wordpress+'import & problem'which is by no means the point of this post. but in case that happens, i hope you read down to this to discover me saying “the wordpress import problem is probably somewhere in my php.ini, the default installation of which is an excellent example of too much information in the way of code-comments provided in the file.” because if it wouldn’t be such a butt-pain to read without all the comments, but my limited understanding of regular expressions keeps me from making that available in any sort of responsible, feasible time. besides which, i’m not really confident of the intrinsic, ongoing, and long-term benefit of seeing that file as just a bunch of settings with no explanations. heh. i’ll just have to sit down and read the whole damn thing one of these days, but….*yawn*….

anyway, we are back, except for #1 Daughter, who is continuing her annual stay with her grandparents, who always enjoy her company. she’ll be coming back on New Year’s Eve, i believe. and we are back, but will quite likely be moving—out of this house at a very likely minimum, and possibly even out of the state. it’s all rather hypothetical right now, but the bottom lines are fairly simple. the Spouse Unit is getting laid off where she works, and some of her best job opportunities could potentially lead us to “follow the money” to places as far apart as Santa Clara, CA to Colorado Springs, CO to Minneapolis, MN to somewhere in Florida. Colorado Springs would be our preferred area if our current location isn’t an option, although Minneapolis would put us closer to the Spouse Unit’s sisters.

but even that aside, the other bottom line is the fact that even after putting a lot of money down on this house when we moved here, the inherent limitations on how much i can make when working almost entirely alone coupled with the fact that companies out here do not come even close to compensating intelligent, well-educated females for what they’re actually worth is forcing us to consider selling this house and moving into town. None of us want to do that, but since we put so much down on the house (which was actually a very good idea on the time, just one that was based primarily on the expectation that it’d take the Spouse Unit about six months to get hired. instead, it took almost 18. and then her layoff comes at the bottom of the bell curve of my business cycle (not many people get married in the winter, and soccer’s not a good game when it’s less than 40 degrees. cold-weather injuries are a bitch).

so, it looks very strongly like we’re moving. we just have to figure out how not to make it an entirely bad thing for #1 Son and #1 Daughter. the photo is from our current front porch just this morning. several retouch methods, obviously. predictably, with the prospect of moving looming over us, i will be more inclined to document the views for what little time i have remaining.

congratulations to my father, by the way. it took the VA until just this past Monday to finally award him 50% disability with back-pay. it should have been at least 75%, but now that he has finally been awarded something, the paperwork, while considerable, is much easier to file. i’m glad you finally got something out of them, Dad. hang in there!

photo credit: AP Photo/Jim Cole

“…Hillary slowly withers.”

original photo credit: AP Photo/Nick Ut

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‘LOLcons’ concept created by Jon Swift and named by Marita.

…being a completely banal exercise in how to wring nonsense from a few facts presented in news reports. have a great weekend, all!

photo credit: Cake Dots’ Wedding Cake, Ltd, Columbus, OH.

A sincerely Happy Birthday wish goes out to my OLD (but not yet entirely enfeebled) friend, Sherri, who has amazingly made it through the age of 40 today! 40 years old. Can you believe it? Geez, that’s like 480 months! Or, 2,080 weeks! Damn, you’re OLD, woman! Everyone please wish Sherri a happy birthday by unexpectedly breaking out into the birthday song of your choice at extremely inappropriate times, such as in the middle of an important meeting, on an elevator full of representatives of a major account, or while standing naked in the middle of the wrong bathroom! Or perhaps more naturally for some of you, by leaving the penile/ejaculate/sexual innuendo of your choice in the comments below. Well, gosh, Sherri, I’d have thought you’d have said thank you by now, but I guess you learned long ago not to talk with your mouth full. Good girl! Happy birthday, Sherri! Now you’re seriously at the head of your class! And here’s hoping your favorite creamy filling satisfies you from head to toe today!

“He fades back to pass…here comes the blitz! He’s scrambling, picks up a good block. He’s looking downfield….looking….looking….scrambling way out to the right, now. Finds his man. He let’s it go: It’s a high-flying ‘Hail Mary’ pass into double-coverage in the end zone! The receiver’s up. He’s got it! He’s got it! TOUCHDOWN, JESUS!!!!

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As promised, here is “Touchdown Jesus” as depicted on the outside of the sanctuary of First Lutheran Church in Brookings, South Dakota. I’m not completely certain that he looks that much like a “Touchdown Jesus”, but that’s how the locals refer to him. I was especially enamored with the homey touch of Christmas lights strung across his forehead and which get shadowed just above his neck. In September. And no doubt year-round. But undoubtedly the fine believers who worship at First Lutheran Church aren’t rednecks. Absolutely not.To me, it kind of looks like Jesus is hanging for dear life on the tightrope of organized religion, but I’ll tactfully not go there.

PhotoShop Contest:

If you care to, you may click on Touchdown Jesus to download a relatively high-resolution file for your very own personal photoshoppy madness. Contact me if you need a higher-resolution file: the one I’m giving you is about 1/3 camera resolution.

What I thought would be fun is this:, I’m kind of wondering what happened to Touchdown Jesus’ feet. I mean, they were supposedly nailed to the cross, right? So how they turned up missing on the poor guy is a bit of a mystery. Comment below with a link to your photoshoppy solutions to this conundrum, and I’ll figure out some sort of nifty prize for the winner(s).

Photograph Copyright © 2007 Dawnne Gee.