Ahab Has A Blog.

Been absent pending time and energy for an engine update...

But just now I've been listening to Boyd Rice vs Bob Larson. Look'em up. I ain't making no links these days. For those who don't know, Boyd Rice was/is a musician, pseudo-fascist, and acerbic atheist not above masquerading as a Wotanist or Satanist; above all, he seemed to enjoy pranking people and tweaking them with outrageous statements just for the sake of it.

All this being said, listening to Boyd go toe-to-toe with Bob Larson, the most striking thing is how closely Boyd Rice's actual statements and apparent beliefs - Social Darwinism in particular - correspond to the actual beliefs of the Republican party in general, and the Bush administration in particular.

The obvious sore thumb here is that the religious right, as a social force, are represented by Bob Larson, and the rest of the Republican Party are represented by the exact opinions espoused by Boyd Rice. The sticky point - and the future of America - depends very much on where the religious right falls out on this wedge, this fulcrum. Do they choose to speak up for their alleged values, or do they follow their authoritarian instincts all the way to hell?

The strong dominate the weak, and the clever dominate the strong. The Bush administration in a nutshell. Republican Christians - do you stand with this, or against it? The world may hang in the balance. The Boyd Rice vs Bob Larson tape plays like an internal debate in the soul of the Republican party. And Bob Larson lost.

Teenage fans of crude music have sex sooner, study finds. In other news, girls who dress like sluts put out more.

Wha's with this story? Is this an attempt to shore up the dykes of hypocrisy now that another moral scold (Joe Lieberman) is about to disappear from the public eye? Or did the wingnut welfare grant just run out this week?

Yes, this one is way late, but... it's so underrated I'm going to bite anyway. Hasn't anyone noticed that "necon" is an oxymoron? Like "new antiques"? Like "jumbo shrimp" ( a LOT like jumbo shrimp, IYKWIM )? Like "Jews for Jesus"? (no, no anti-Semitic motive hidden in that one - and being an anti-crypto-Zionist doesn't count).

And yet (well, OK, there is some crrypto-Zionism that negates the use of "yet"), you can google "neocon oxymoron" and find this. Anonymous comments are verboten, but I would have replied this:

I don't want to blow my own horn (okay, maybe I do), but I happen to think I fall into Dr. Westen's "ruthless self-reflection" category. Of course, I bet that everyone puts him/herself into that category--no one's a mindless partisan, right? Right? (Except the other side, course). I'm not concerned with your horn. But the post-1980 Right in the West is almost obsesively non-self-reflective.. Have you been living in a fucking hole? Have you ever heard even the tiniest morsel of self-reflection from Bush, Cheney, Rove, Rumsfeld et. al? Not a fucking chance.

ymarsakar's childish distinction "60s socialism vs self-sacrifice) - and the post itself - ignores a critical fact.

conservatives stopped doing self-reflection at the start of the cold war. they are afraid it makes them look wimpy. that's why Boosh can't figure out what a colossal failure he is.

Liberalism - that is, all modern government that isn't a failure - has nothing to do with avoiding pain. And conservativism has nothing to do with confronting pain. If it did, you'd see more conservatives engaging in self-reflection and/or signing up to fight the battles they believe in. Instead, the ratio of conservatives saying "I got mine" to those saying "Government pork is bad" has climbed to historically embarrassing levels. Instead, Repulicans have promoted only two real values in recent decasdes (snooping into the bedrooms of others does not count as a moral value, unless you are a Pharisee): winning is everything. Well, ok, that's just one, but I was trying to do them a favor. Liberallism, on the other hand, stems from a critical recognition that good government should have, as part of its core principles, avoiding the creation of misery, and the alleviation of it, when practical.

Pretty simple, ain't it?

You can disagree, but then again you can die in a government-caused famine "for the greater good". That's not a choice; it's an observation.

You know those e-mails you get from people who forward you random junk? This isn't one of them. At least I don't think. I do believe that the person who sent this to me actually said this, himself. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Don't tell me otherwise.

I was visiting with some other prospective jurors at the courthouse prior to going in to see which of us would draw the short straws. The elderly man in front of me had turned around to say that there was no way he could serve, he had to pee too often; "Sometimes, every fifteen minutes."

I asked if he had spoken to his doctor about that or had his prostate checked out.

"I don't remember," he said.

"You would," I suggested.

I told him about things like Flomax and said that I found help taking Saw Palmetto.

"Oh, yeah I remember that, it was a kind of candy bar!"

"I believe you're thinking about Walnetto which was actually a little cello-wrapped tray of wrapped walnut caramels," I said. "It's not the same."

"Geez, they were good though weren't they?" "Yes," I said, "they were great and the last time they made them we were all still able to piss a roll of quarters thirty feet up a hillside and then turn it so it wouldn't roll back down again."

All the nearby fogies had a good laugh except him. He wondered; "What happened to the quarters?"

"We know dogs aren't born mooing." At first, it seems like a stupid question. But once you understand the context, you realize it's a very, very stupid question.

But what about people? Are they "born gay"? An interesting question. Many, if not most, people who report themselves as gay seem to feel that way. I have yet to hear anyone finish a sentence with "and that's when I decided to be gay." Kind of telling, isn't it?

But that doesn't exactly answer the question. I'd like to answer the question with a question: Hasn't anyone in focus on the family ever seen a dog fuck another dog in the ass? Dogs only follow their natures - that was the original premise of asking why dogs don't moo. So it seems fair to note that dogs - and many other animals - show us that gay behavior is part of the repetoire of "natural" behavior.

In conclusion: "We know social conservatives aren't born thinking for themselves. But can they learn?"

Ever heard one of those jackass Republicans defending the destruction of the Bill of Rights by playing - yet again - the terrorism card? And hear them says this: "The Constitution is not a suicide pact."

Uh, yeah, right. You have a point there, Congressman Fraidypants. It's true - that was really the Declaration of Independence, wasn't it now? But it's good that we're clear on which of our nation's founding documents you and Senator Scaredycat are denouncing. I mean, I wouldn't want to accuse you of pissing on the Constitution when it's the Declaration of Independence you despise.

We'll save the Constitution for later, when we discuss how cowardly you are for saying "You don't need civil rights when you are dead."

"As soon as the Iraqis stand up," we keep hearing, "we'll stand down".

The question is: stand up to whom?

The problem is: they are standing up - to America.

Somehow when Joe Klein - Time's alleged Democratic columnist - writes about Dubya, it sounds really fawning and creepy. Not so much in a gay way as in a confused hetero way. You know, the kind who goes all Mr. Goodbar on you.

But it has an interesting ending, the meaning of which seems to escape Klein - who castigates Kerry for demaning withdrawal by the end of the year:

"I know it's the cliche of the war," an Army counterinsurgency specialist told me last week. "But we'll know in the next six months-and this time, it'll be the last next six months we get."

Hmm... Looks like the counterinsurgency specialist reads lefty blogs and agrees with the criticism of Friedman. Looks like one specialist needs a visit from the Moustache of Understanding.