In San Francisco.....

I'm down in "Baghdad by the Bay" for the weekend, and the weather is gorgeous. Did my usual haunts last night (Top of the Mark and the Tonga Room) and am heading back to Seattle tonight.

While here, I had a realization: If you look at the west coast cities as the Brady women, Seattle is definitely Jan. LA is Marsha: All superficial and bitchy, San Francisco is Carol Brady: The oldest and most sophisticated, always schlepping the work off on Alice (represented by Oakland) and Portland, with all it's tree-huggy cuteness, is Cindy. But Seattle is definitely Jan: Geeky, smart, pretty, but insecure.

The Seattle inferiority complex is well represented by our leading businesses: Starbucks, Microsoft and Nordstrom. All three are somewhat bland, and trying to be someone else. Starbucks wants to be the coffee shop on "Friends", Microsoft wants to be Apple, and Nordstrom wants to be Bloomingdales, but without all the Jewishness (Which, ironically enough, is what makes Bloomingdales the much more interesting store. ) It's not that Nordstrom is anti-semetic, it's just that they are from Nordic Lutheran stock, and as such just not capable of pulling it off.

It should also be noted that all three are notoriously overpriced and overhyped, which is also true of Seattle.

Once you understand the west coast in this context, it all makes sense. Why hasn't anyone thought of it before?

God, people are stupid....

After the tragedy in London this morning, I happened to wander into a message board that I frequent that talks about vintage stuff.

For some reason, a thread about the London attacks had started. All of the people posting (mostly Americans, of course) were saying truly moronic things. The most mornonic thing was some drivel about how "Satan is all around us"

Satan? Hardly.

What causes terrorism? Extreme poverty. What causes poverty? Lack of education and economic opportunity, both of which are rampant in the middle east.

Why are they rampant? Because the west supports crappy governments who squander the oil money, concentrate it among an elite class, and let the rest of the citizens fend for themselves.

That's it in a nutshell kids. No bogeyman. No Satan. Just humans treating other humans like shit, and the wealthy countries standing on the throats of those in the third world.

It's all about the greed. What did Jesus say about the greed?

Duh.

A Fourth of July Conundrum...

I always like to put my flag out on the Fourth of July, but this year I was ambivalent about it - especially after that jackass of a "president" suggested that we fly our flags as a symbol of support for the war.

Now, I do "support the troops" - both fiscally (through the taxes I pay) and personally (my three cousins who are over in that ridiculous pointless mess) so I wanted to show my support for the COUNTRY, and for the TROOPS, but I didn't want it to make it look like I support president Boozy McDraftDodger's stupid war, so I opted for something else.

Ladies and Gentlemen, meet the peace flag:



Before you write me off as a radical, let me tell you this: Sure, I had to go all the way to Portland to buy it in a head shop, but even my 81 year old mother (who is about as good as an American as you can get, even if she is a Papist) loved this idea when I told it to her, and wants to know where she can find one. You can be sure that a gift flag is coming to her.

And I know as sure as I am sitting here that my Dad, the WWII veteran, would approve of this patriotic compromise in a time when you have to make your political statements very concise.

Happy Independence Day, everybody!!!!

Those stupid Liberals....

I believe this speaks for itself :-)

Day in the Life of Joe Middle-Class Republican
By John Gray Cincinnati, Ohio - jgray7@cinci.rr.com - July - 2004


Joe gets up at 6:00am to prepare his morning coffee. He fills his pot full of good clean drinking water because some liberal fought for minimum water quality standards. He takes his daily medication with his first swallow of coffee. His medications are safe to take because some liberal fought to insure their safety and work as advertised.

All but $10.00 of his medications are paid for by his employers medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance, now Joe gets it too. He prepares his morning breakfast, bacon and eggs this day. Joe’s bacon is safe to eat because some liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.

Joe takes his morning shower reaching for his shampoo; His bottle is properly labeled with every ingredient and the amount of its contents because some liberal fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained. Joe dresses, walks outside and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean because some tree hugging liberal fought for laws to stop industries from polluting our air. He walks to the subway station for his government subsidized ride to work; it saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees. You see, some liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.

Joe begins his work day; he has a good job with excellent pay, medicals benefits, retirement, paid holidays and vacation because some liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Joe’s employer pays these standards because Joe’s employer doesn’t want his employees to call the union. If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed he’ll get a worker compensation or unemployment check because some liberal didn’t think he should loose his home because of his temporary misfortune.

Its noon time, Joe needs to make a Bank Deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe’s deposit is federally insured by the FSLIC because some liberal wanted to protect Joe’s money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the depression.

Joe has to pay his Fannie Mae underwritten Mortgage and his below market federal student loan because some stupid liberal decided that Joe and the government would be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his life-time.

Joe is home from work, he plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his car for the drive to dads; his car is among the safest in the world because some liberal fought for car safety standards. He arrives at his boyhood home. He was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers Home Administration because bankers didn’t want to make rural loans. The house didn’t have electric until some big government liberal stuck his nose where it didn’t belong and demanded rural electrification. (Those rural Republican’s would still be sitting in the dark)

He is happy to see his dad who is now retired. His dad lives on Social Security and his union pension because some liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Joe wouldn’t have to. After his visit with dad he gets back in his car for the ride home.
He turns on a radio talk show, the host’s keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. (He doesn’t tell Joe that his beloved Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day) Joe agrees, “We don’t need those big government liberals ruining our lives; after all, I’m a self made man who believes everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have”.