After my chores I spent a couple hours exploring on the Voodoo Nakisi.
“Hello?”
Joe Biden woke me up this morning. Either him or Fred Willard, I can’t be sure.
It was a dream, of course. We watched both of them last night — first Fred in “Best in Show,” and then Joe in “The State of the Union.”
Fred killed, and Joe had to follow him, which is bad news for any headliner, especially when that headliner is Joe.
The poor sonofabitch. He finally grabs what he thinks is the brass ring and it turns out to be Voldemort Putin’s man-tanned-and-waxed, KGB-issued butthole. In a rebooted DC Universe edition of Robert A. Heinlein’s “The Crazy Years,” just to give it an edge like Oddjob’s bowler.
Out in the woods.
And then, after a year that must have felt like the first hot lap in the Lake of Fire Criterium, he gets trotted out to recite the Laundry List of Shit That Will Never Happen for the political equivalent of Principal Poop’s pep rally from The Firesign Theatre’s “Don’t Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers.”
Over my lifetime the State of the Union has devolved from a simple constitutional requirement — see Article II, Section 3 — into a low-rent show-and-tell for a politically insane kindergarten. An excuse for eejits to dress badly and act worse while popping up and down like prairie dogs crazed on ketamine.
We were streaming this mess via PBS, which looked like CCTV from a Topeka nursing home. That outfit needs new blood worse than Dracula.
Now, I’ve had a soft spot for Joe ever since he strangled Paul Ryan in his crib during their 2012 vice-presidential debate. And I think he’s doing his level best with both hands and one leg tied behind his back.
But still, god damn, etc. After he and/or Fred woke me up this morning the song playing in my head was an old Leon Russell number, from the appropriately titled album “Carny,” called “Out in the Woods.”
Tags: Sleepy Joe, State of the Union, The Firesign Theatre, Voldemort Putin
Mad Blog Media 
March 2, 2022 at 9:55 am |
It was a weird speech, and the broadcast to our home was not top quality. It looked like the Russians were trying to jam it.
To me, Joe could have cut to the chase rather than going through a laundry list of Stuff That Likely Won’t Get Done: “We gotta deal with Putin first, and figure out all this other stuff later. Hang in there, hug your dog, and pray to God or whatever entity you so desire that we don’t end up kissing our asses goodbye.”
March 2, 2022 at 10:05 am |
Were you streaming NMPBS? Hay Zeus, it was pixellated in parts and basically lo-res throughout. Our Internets have been acting up — ScenturyStink says “the network box is down and not receiving signal” — but still, damn, etc.
Meanwhile, Thomas Jefferson was right. Fuck a bunch of speechifying. Send the assholes a memo, let ’em yell at a piece of paper.
March 2, 2022 at 10:12 am |
Yes, via Applebox. It was awful. And we have high speed Xfinity and the TV normally looks just fine. Not sure why it was awful. My guess it was a problem on the sender side.
March 2, 2022 at 10:42 am |
That’s interesting about the State of dis-Union Address signal reception. The through-the-air signal I get courtesy of a relay tower across the river was peachy-keen. All the more because unless the Russians are still watching me, nobody knows what channel I’m on.
What was it he said again? Oh yeah. Blah, blah, blah, Putin. Blah, blah, blah Russia. I always wonder why folks put so much attention into the Address. The President is in most cases, going to spew forth the political line bs. Anybody that pays attention to multiple news sources can instead simply turn on an old rerun of The Munsters and at least get some humor out of it. (ie: Lurch = Biden).
It might be a good time to buy some land in a very remote location about now. That is until somebody in Russia that has the backbone of Zelensky gets the butterfly net over Vlady and hauls him off to peel potatoes in Novaya Zemliya.
March 2, 2022 at 10:51 am |
New Mexico PBS is routinely piss-poor, in my experience. We can’t get much over the air because El Rancho Pendejo sits at the bottom of a cul-de-sac and the TVs shoot overhead without so much as a by-your-leave. So we stream everything.
As for the SOTU, I usually watch one every term so I can chart the collapse of empire in real time. I sat out last term.
March 2, 2022 at 11:58 am |
I certainly sat out the last three. Last night we went old school and listened on NPR. We had just spiffy audio on the digital NPR signal from the repeater on the mountain top in Bisbee. It has the whole San Pedro river valley in its line of sight. When he got to the part about Afghanistan, and the wicked witch of the West started cackling, supported by the bimbo from the South, I flipped it to the classical station.
March 2, 2022 at 12:43 pm |
It seems amateurish that an elected politician has the need to cackle about something that obviously most of the gop does not like. Wouldn’t it be better for her to just kick back and do something productive such as playing candy crush on her smartphone? The same really goes for standing up and clapping during key emotional moments during the speech. Give me a break and get on with it. The American public has more important things to do like watch the next episode of the Walking Dead.
March 2, 2022 at 1:43 pm |
It’s just the worst sort of amateur hour. Virtue signaling. Us good, them bad, etc. Any tank-town dinner theater or high-school drama department could do better.
March 2, 2022 at 6:13 pm |
Yeah – the wicked witch (I call her something else) supposedly represents me…not sure how or why. But methinks she is a huge waste of space, a complete embarrassment and…(fill in the blank). When will she be smacked down? When will she do something productive? I changed my voter affiliation to Independent so I can vote in the Repug primary – get rid of her.
March 2, 2022 at 7:39 pm |
Haw. My man Hal used to do that. Said it was the only way to have a say in Crusty County, where the Repugs decide who does what to whom and who gets paid.
March 2, 2022 at 8:50 pm |
I’d say something about a person being registered in one god offal party in order to vote in the primary, and then switch back to the other side at party time, but then I don’t know anything about what I was talking about. It seems though that it would be logical to want a person’s party member to run against the “best” candidate in the other party.
March 3, 2022 at 5:26 am |
I have been registered as “no party affiliation/independent” since it started (1993?) in Arizona. I have voted in different party primaries a number of times. I want the two most qualified candidates to run for an office. It would tickle the shit out of me if everyone did this, as it would drive the political parties, pundits, talking heads, and pollsters crazy. Boebert is simply not qualified for congress, and JG actions make perfect sense to me.
March 3, 2022 at 6:37 am |
Meanwhile, the Repugs want to head JG off at the pass.
March 3, 2022 at 8:07 am |
Yes – I saw that article in the Sun…. just guessing now, but I think that if I was the only person doing this that the elfinks would just have sent Guido over to break my knees.
March 3, 2022 at 9:20 am |
We have closed primaries down here in the Land of Entrapment, which is the sole reason I remain a registered Democrat.
As far as open primaries? We had them in Hawaii but that was in the 1990’s and then there was California Democratic Party v Jones, 2000, which if I understand it, said open primaries violated free association. But then there was another Supremes case in Washington State. Both discussed here:
https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/129/california-democratic-party-v-jones
Seems to me this two party primary system sells out government to the two increasingly insular parties and the rest of us can pound sand. I don’t like it.
March 3, 2022 at 11:24 am |
Thing is, the alternatives can’t get any traction. It’s like watching mom-and-pop shops squaring off against Amazon and Walmart.
Sure, the Libertarians, Greens, Socialists, Communists, and independents all run “presidential campaigns,” but it’s pissing in the wind. How many third-party outfits are doing the unglamorous gruntwork of fielding candidates for school boards, city councils, county commissions, and statehouses?
And unglamorous it is, as anyone who’s ever worked a campaign knows. Even if you’re knocking on doors and making calls for one of The Big Two. But if you don’t start hitting in the minors, you’ll never make The Bigs.
March 3, 2022 at 11:19 am |
As eluded to above, registering as a specific party member in the Spring to vote in the primary, and then changing your affiliation in the summer to vote in the Fall meets the legal criteria for cross-poll-a-nation (sorry, I just had to do it). This however, is only logical when the party you favor has a solid candidate to win the primary. Of course, if a State were to change the time period you’d need to be a member of a party before you could vote, then this method would not be possible. But then I believe that making that kind of a time restriction would be unconstitutional.
It’s funny isn’t it. It all comes down to restricting the voting rights of an individual. Something that a certain russian leader does very well.
March 3, 2022 at 11:52 am |
In Arizona if you are registered as an independent you can vote in either party primary but not both. No change to registration is required.
March 3, 2022 at 5:13 pm |
In Hawaii when I lived there you could vote in any primary, but in only one of them as well. Not sure how they do it now. The Dems were far more numerous than the GOP members and the fear was always that enough Dems would vote in the GOP primary to make sure the biggest loser was the winner.
March 3, 2022 at 1:23 pm |
Crosspollination!