Category: Deep political thought

Rock and roll

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 31 Comments
¡Hot plate, señores!
¡Hot plate, señores!

Bad citizen. Instead of watching last night’s debate, I made chicken-quesadilla platters using leftovers from previous cookery — a spicy chipotle chicken filling for tacos and pinto beans— and some freshly made Mexican rice.

I had been thinking in terms of bean burritos and rice, smothered in green chile, but we both had green chile stew for lunch and a second round seemed a bit much, as did the thought of watching the Wicked Witch of Whitewater and Comrade Eeyore braying at each other.

Don’t get me wrong. Barring some hellish catastrophe I expect to pull the lever for Eeyore in the primary and then, if need be, hold my nose and vote for the Witch in the general. But I’m too old a hoor to pretend I’m enjoying it.

As usual, Charles P. Pierce makes the salient point: If a Donk wins, he or she will still face a GOP-controlled House full of hacks, eejits and loons, and as with the Socialist Mooslim Kenyan Usurper-In-Chief, getting them to agree on the time of day will be an uphill push that will make Sisyphus’s little pasatiempo look like shooting marbles. He adds:

“The idea that Hillary Rodham Clinton will bring these people to heel, given the fact that most of them were raised in a conservative political culture that regards her as Maleficent Of The Ozarks, strikes me as just as fanciful as anything Bernie Sanders has said on the subject of student loans or health-care reform.”

Word. If either should become the nation’s Commander-In-Chief, neither Comrade Eeyore nor the Wicked Witch of Whitewater will be able to order the Flying Monkey Caucus to straighten up and fly right.

From Muscatine to muscatel

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 36 Comments
It's morning in America.
It’s morning in America.

It seems Iowa Republicans would rather be poisoned than shot.

As for their Democratic counterparts, they split right down the middle between Billary of Wall Street and Groucho Sanders, The Last Marx Brother. Kindly Father Martin O’Malley won the third stool from the door at the Red Rooster Grill in Iowa Falls and decided to call it a campaign.

The editorial board at The New York Times appears to be about two martinis away from jumping out a window over the GOP clusterfuck. As for the Donks, the board opines that the contest has become one between head and heart. Guess which candidate is which body part. There will be a prize.

“With a few of the weakest candidates starting to drop out, weary voters can only hope that the campaign will further clarify itself and become more substantive in coming weeks as it moves to New Hampshire and beyond,” mutters The Times.

Ah, yes, that ol’ hopey-changey thing. Hope in one hand, shit in the other, see which one fills up fastest.

 

With a bang and a whimper

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 24 Comments
We can put a man on the moon, but just you try getting four of 'em out of a bird sanctuary.
We can put a man on the moon, but just you try getting four of ’em out of a bird sanctuary.

Sounds like the Redneck Revolution is on its last legs … well, outside Burns, Oregon, anyway.

The fuzz capped LaVoy Finicum, who appears to have charged them, first in a vehicle, and then on foot. Didn’t even get to draw down on them with his bad nine, yo. And the occupying army is down to four. Like the Black Knight, they’ll be happy to call it a draw. Um, no. Not until you do the Silly Walk.

I think these guys watched too many John Wayne movies and didn’t read nearly enough books. Their only point was to be found above the eyebrows and under the Stetson. Definitely time to fire the PR guy.

Whoops. Too late.

 

Fear and loathing … but mostly loathing

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 12 Comments
Fear and Loathing, Campaign Trail style
The more things change, etc.

Every time I read a story like this I wish someone could reanimate Hunter S. Thompson and send him lurching back out on the campaign trail.

Wouldn’t you like to get the take on Ted Cruz, Donald Trump and Marco Rubio from the guy who wrote: “Any political party that can’t cough up anything better than a treacherous brain-damaged old vulture like Hubert Humphrey deserves every beating it gets. They don’t hardly make ’em like Hubert any more — but just to be on the safe side, he should be castrated anyway.”

Or of the inevitability of Richard Nixon: “This may be the year when we finally come face to face with ourselves; finally just lay back and say it — that we really are just a nation of 230 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns, and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable.”

Or: “Jesus! Where will it end? How low do you have to stoop in this country to be President?”

Abbey Road, or Downton Funk

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 17 Comments
You can have any color you like as long as it's red.
You can have any color you like as long as it’s red.

Herself and I settled down before the Eye last night with plates of salad and chicken quesadillas to enjoy the president’s final State of the Union address, only to find that the local PBS affiliate was airing “Masterpiece.”

Commies.

And worse, Limey commies, as the show was “Downton Abbey.”

So we switched to the White House website and caught most of Obama’s act, though the Mini spazzed out at the end, pre-empting him with The Spinning Beach Ball of Doom just as he cranked up the volume, and thus we missed the big denouement.

I enjoyed the departure from traditional practice, which has come to elevate ritual over substance. As the prez took the long view, it was particularly amusing to note the discomfiture of the clappers, who were mostly denied easy applause lines.

But I was surprised that he still seems surprised that the other team won’t play ball with him simply because he’s a Kenyan Mooslim National Socialist sissypants.

Still, I felt his pain. I’ve been preaching a gospel of equal parts socialism and substance abuse for years and not one of yis has opened a free-booze-and-bike-parts outlet.