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Heardy-Wordy-Gurdy, another award-winning win-win for everyone!

Hey, folks, let's play "Heardy-Wordy-Gurdy!"

Huh?  What’s that? 

A game.  I’ll show how we each hear things differently.  Ready?  Let's go!

What if you heard someone say the President has loose bowels.  You’d say, “What?  I didn’t know he had colon issues?”  And I’d say, “Colon?  What colon?  The speaker said the President has loose ‘vowels.’  Everyone knows that without a teleprompter, his A-E-I-O-U’s have the consistency of a runny stool.” 

Alright, we did good!  Here’s another one.

Suppose you heard someone say Obama is an opium addict.  You’d say, “What?  He’s a druggie?”  And I’d say, “Drugs?  Who said anything about drugs?  The speaker said he’s an ‘OPM’ addict.  OPM is an acronym for ‘Other Peoples’ Money.’  Everyone knows the President is addicted to other peoples’ money.”

Okay, we’re rolling.  If we stumble over “bowels” vs. “vowels” and “opium” vs. “O.P.M,” we’ll have serious fun with complex stuff.  Round three.

What if we heard the President say, "We're not trying to push financial reform because we begrudge success that's fairly earned. I mean, I do think at a certain point you've made enough money. But, you know, part of the American way is, you know, you can just keep on making it if you're providing a good product or providing good service. We don’t want people to stop, ah, fulfilling the core responsibilities of the financial system to help grow our economy."

You’d say he was concerned about us making too much money, or not enough of it, doing too much of one thing or not enough of another, and as long as it doesn’t screw up the economy, he’d like to ration what we do, when, where and how much, like in Chairman Mao’s work collectives before communist China discovered free enterprise.  And I’d say, no way, he meant like the former Soviet Russia before it melted down.

And there y’go!  Game over!  Another award-winning Heardy-Wordy-Gurdy production!

Who won? 

Depends on what you heard.

3,500 calories and a magic mountain of debt – positively entertaining!

 
Adversity reveals character.  Adversity reveals characters as well.           

Budget negotiations qualify as adversity.  In this drama, the adversarial characters are Congress and the President.  While they differ in name and style, both are suited-up for battle in gear made from similar character material. 

Congress likes money, lots of money, and burns through it with the pace of a counterfeiter rushing to stay a step ahead of the feds.  The President likes money, too.  He spends it with the frenzy of a foodie with an open line of credit at stuff-your-face buffet.

The short bio for these characters reads as follows:  Congress thrives on pork, while Obama sates his inner porker.  If government has a system of checks-and-balances, it doesn't work here – both characters are out-of-control gluttons.

The economy is wobbly, revenues have slowed and the federal budget is fated to explode.  Yet it doesn’t occur to these gluttons to tighten their belts and reduce consumption.  Washington is called the “Beltway” for good reason; it wears its belt on the last notch.  Role model characters?  You bet!

The trademark of a leader is doing, not jawing.  Strong leaders never command constituents to carry out orders they personally ignore.  Deeds reflect the character of someone to follow and respect.

During times of adversity, a nation needs strong leaders.  Where do we find someone  to fill the bill?  From whom do we draw inspiration?  Congress?  Too risky.  Or maybe the house at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?  

If the fat guy in the cartoon resembles the skinny guy in the White House, it’s not a coincidence – the comparison is paradoxical and intentional.  It’s paradoxical, because Skinny WH Guy will never get fat and he can eat all the junk he wants.  It’s intentional, merely to point out that as the nation’s Hypocrite-in-Chief, he can snort barrels of baked brie, while we graze on bushels of raw spinach.  What a character!

 

If the budget war copies the same strategy as the war on obesity, Skinny WH Guy shows how to win.  Last month in Iowa, he made a pilgrimage to his favorite eatery, Ross Restaurant, where he ordered four “Magic Mountains,” the house specialty  – “…grilled Texas toast topped with loose steamed hamburger meat, piled high with a choice of French fries or hash browns, homemade cheddar cheese sauce, as well as two Volcanoes, which is the Magic Mountain with the addition of a scoop of 5-alarm meat chili and onions on top.”

Worth noting:  the restaurant is a 24-hour operation, an ideal command post for a leader to showcase his non-stop subservience to hypocrisy.  How's that for a character with "character?"  Positively entertaining.

Gags, gag rules and prayer-gags

 
Sergeant Rafferty was enjoying the camaraderie of his buddies.  The boisterous squadron was returning to base from a tense, yet uneventful patrol in the red zone.

The streets were narrow and the driver, Specialist Soto, downshifted the Humvee M998 to navigate the crowd.  As the vehicle leaned into a turn, voices grew louder.  Rafferty instinctively turned toward the commotion and saw a speeding vehicle on collision course.

No time for evasive action.  Crrwangg!!  A bone-jarring impact.  Acrid stench of explosives and burning fuel.  A grotesque medley of anguished screams and metallic bedlam.  A suicidal insurgent’s dream come true.  Lights out. 

Time compressed.  Lights back on, but not bright.  Rafferty was wrapped in white-hot thermal underwear with sandpaper insulation.  Or so he thought – the mind unhinges when the body yields to shock.  He alternated in and out of consciousness.

Lights dimmer still.  He was the lone survivor of an attack by a Vehiclle Borne Improvised Explosive Device.  Soto, Vanderveer, Kennard – all of them, gone.  Pink mist, bone fragments and scorched tattooed flesh scattered along a dirty street in Khandijar.

Vignettes of special moments – family, friends, his wife and seven-month old daughter – all floating eerily through his mind.  A dark emptiness enshrouded him.  Sergeant  Rafferty felt desparately alone.

The blurry silhouette of a chaplain hovered.  Rafferty was not religious, but his life was guided by a sense of correctness.  And in this moment of aloneness, as he slipped closer to the edge of mortality, his mind posited that if there if there was a God, He would demonstrate His compassion by accepting Rafferty for who he was.

Rafferty struggled to tug the chaplain’s sleeve.  “Chaplain…” he mumbled, “…will The Lord have me…as I am?”

The chaplain winced.  “Ahh, sorry, Sergeant, I can’t intervene.  Section 5, Article 3 of DOD Circular 18520, Revised July 2011, requires prior consent to all words of last rites, and prohibits the spontaneous invocation of The Almighty’s name, even during matters involving the demise of a government issue such as yourself...”

Rafferty was stunned.  He yielded to the pull of darkness and loosened his grip on the chaplain’s arm.  The chaplain looked away, embarrassed, then turned and said, “I can, however, offer you cantaloupe-flavored ice-chips, for comfort during your final moments.  It’s not the same as the Lord’s Prayer, but it soothes parched lips…”

Rafferty grunted and let go.  He disliked cantaloupe.  Dark-dark, a flash of bright white, then dark again.  Pitch black.  Silence. 

Stillness. 

 

Sergeant Rafferty’s narrative is not far-fetched if Arleen Ocasio gets her way.

 

Who?

 

If you haven’t heard, tune in and listen up. 

 

Ms. Ocasio is the director of Houston’s Veterans’ Administration cemetery.  Unofficially, she is a career policy wonk with credentials ideal for a first-of-its-kind appointment as “Prayer Czar,”  the latest iteration of Generalissimo Obama’s crusade to change the soul of America, one bureaucracy at a time.

     

As Prayer Czar, or more accurately, Prayer Monitor, she is the de facto editor of all spiritual dialogue and communications on behalf of deceased war veterans and their bereaved.

 

Straight out of the chute, Ocasio demonstrated a flair for astonishing feats of stupidity.  She disenfranchised V.A. chaplains by prohibiting utterances of The Almighty's name at burial services, and required pre-approval of all prayers and last rites. And to let everyone know she's boss, she converted the chapel into a general purpose meeting hall, for pick-up bingo and rant-fests for unemployed poets.       

 

Locally, the blowback went down like this:  When he heard about Ocasio, Congressman Ted Poe blew a head-gasket.  Congressman Gene Green blew smoke and said he had to think about it when asked by radio show host Michael Berry for his opinion.  Nobody wanted to know what Sheila Jackson Lee blows.    

 

But what’s to think?  Clearly, freedom of worship is under siege here, but any rush to its defense is a distraction from another major concern:  commitment – making it and delivering on it as agreed.

 

When he joined the military, Sergeant Rafferty made a commitment.  He became party to a contract with the government, and he took an oath to defend the USA.  In return, the government agreed to a compensation package that included pay, food, housing, education and a host of other benefits.

 

For his part, Rafferty delivered and gave all – his life.  A decent and honorable burial is what the government has traditionally offered in return, a burial that respects a soldier's beliefs and wishes.  

 

If Sergeant Rafferty wanted a hound dog to howl the "Hail Mary" at his own funeral, he is owed that.  

 

Now it's the government's turn to deliver on its commitment.  And no low-watt flunky bureaucrat has the authority to change the rules.

22 million barrel emergency travel fund

 

Mystery of the month – why did Mr. Obama call in a take-out order for 22 million barrels of oil from the nation’s piggy bank?   

 

Answer – we’ll never know.  Great minds have been pondering his motives for over a week and no one’s figured out what sparks his pistons.  That's why he's called the “Enigma-in-Chief.”              

 

But not everything’s a secret.  Outside the White House where information flows freely, there are things to learn that help solve riddles.  Things like the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, slant-hole drilling, and a man’s devotion to his wife.  Read on.

 

Strategic Petroleum Reserve  In the 70’s, an idea was hatched to buffer the nation against disruptions of oil supplies.  The plan called for stockpiling surplus oil in storage facilities – underground salt caverns – at key sites along the Gulf Coast.  Four facilities went into service and the oil trickled in.  30 years later, the SPR filled to capacity at 727 million barrels.  We were prepared for any emergency, regardless of magnitude.

 

According to latest USEIA data, America burns through 19 million barrels of crude oil and petroleum products every day.  7 million barrels is domestic production and 12 million is imported.  The imports are from a diverse mix of countries, most of whom are friendly types, while the rest are cut-throat merchants motivated by mounds of moolah.

 

67% of our imports arrives from 5 countries.  Canada is the single largest supplier, beating Saudi Arabia by twice the output.  Nigeria and Mexico pick up the slack, followed by Venezuela whenever Hugo Chavez isn’t spellbound by Sean Penn’s down-with-America venom and babble. 

 

USEIA statistics further show oil imports have actually declined since 2005.  This infers we’re less dependent on unstable countries led by deranged moonbats with unpronounceable names, who on any given day could yank a million barrels off the supply shelf and send the market into apoplexy.  Thus, the SPR’s raison d’etre.

 

What’s interesting is who’s absent from the list of oil suppliers…Iran...and if this doesn’t perplex, it should.  Because without Mahmoud I’m-a-Dippy-Jerk threatening to close his spigot, where’s the urgency to open ours?

 

Just for grins, indulge the idea Mahmoud can make a cork big enough to stopper up our 12 million barrel import pipeline completely.  Now run the numbers:  When called into action, SPR facilities can provide for a maximum draw-down rate of 4 million barrels a day.  If Mahmoud’s supply disruption persists, simple math says without a “Plan B” the SPR will be bone-dry in 6 months.  Then what?  Sunflower seeds and donkeys?

 

Oh, and Obama’s 22 million barrels?  Gone in less than a week.  And all we have to show for it is a tie-dyed T-shirt with pastel zeros.  What fun!

 

Slant-Hole Drilling  In the oil industry’s early years, long before the SPR or the horizontal drilling boom, typical wells were “straight holes.”  These were wells drilled vertically, with little deviation, from the surface of the ground to the oil sands thousands of feet below. 

 

In those days, most industry folks were diligent, hard-nosed and not adverse to work or risk.  If their geology was good, operators were rewarded with barn-burners, prolific wells that came in at thousands of barrels a day and upwards.  Nice payday.  

 

Not everyone had the DNA to drill ethical wells.  A devious technique called “slant-hole drilling” caught favor among oil field scoundrels.  The goal was simple:  rather than drilling a vertical well, “slant-hole operators” would change the direction of the drill-bit and guide it in at an angle, allowing them to slip under a neighboring operator’s lease-line and tap into his reservoir. 

       

In legalese, this is “mineral trespass,” a little hunk of long-forgotten lore enjoyed mainly by unimaginative hacks who wanted nothing more from life except a free ride on the shoulders of others’ successes.  Or ne-er-do-wells trying to see what they could get away with, like reaching underneath a table to cop a feel off another dude’s girl-friend. 

 

Either way, miscreants were met with fair warning:  “This ain’t yer proppity, so git off – trespassers will be violated!”   

          

Devoted Husbands  If a man is devoted to his wife, there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for her when she’s in a jam.  Conversation overheard in the White House Oval Office: 

 

“Hey, honey.  Listen, I’m in Zambizi on our “Back to our Roots Tour” and you know Shaneiqua?  Our budget director?  Well, she’s clueless with numbers and we, like, ran out of gas and I’m stuck in this stink-hole with 400 whiny interns and assistants, two 747's on empty and 35 tons of clothes and luggage, and I was thinkin’ maybe you can talk to your homeys to get us some emergency fuel.” 

  

“Sure thing, sugar-buns, think 10 million barrels would handle it?” 

  

“Tell ya what, round it up to 22 million in case I have another emergency."

 

 And there you go!  No more mystery.

The transparent sounds of no hands clapping

 

The latest honor lathered on “The One” unleashed a wave of widespread snickers recently.  Seems that earlier, while we slept, a furtive clique of Machiavellian types met behind closed doors for a stealth tribute to Obama.

And what merits this covert distinction?

Hold on, here it comes...

...Barack’s enduring commitment to the principles of transparency.

HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!

If ever we needed an example of not losing sleep over lost irony, Obama's the man.  In the style of a true achiever, he lowered the bar beyond the reach of all competition.

HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!      

Ohmygod, I’m better now, but I’m not sure I can finish writing.  Today’s post was supposed to be about metaphors and analogies, as in “Obama is to transparency as a whore is to chastity” but I can’t continue.  I’m too weak from laughter.

Instead, let’s close with this:  What noise is heard when someone receives a secret award for openness?   Answer:  The sounds of no hands clapping.

C’mon, give it up!  You can applause for that.

Fire in the fox-hole!

 

2011 began well enough. 

 

When John Boehner pried the speaker’s gavel from Nancy Pelosi’s cold, grasping claws, wise-minded folks lapped in the wind-stream of ecstasy.  Revelers filled their lungs with gulps of much-needed fresh air and chanted “Ding Dong the Witch is dead!”  Pelosi’s fetid aura slithered into the La Brea tar pits, her grating cackle went silent.      

 

Then 2011 went weird.

 

No one imagined life without the Dragon Lady would be so desolate and empty.  The same wise minds who rejoiced only moments earlier, were ill-prepared for moments later when the daily fix of her comic drivel dried up.  They entered “The No-Pelosi Zone,” otherwise known as addiction withdrawal.  And it wasn’t pretty. 

 

Fortunately for Pelosi-addicts, there are 12-step recovery programs to steer them safely through the agonizing stages of withdrawal.    

 

Big government stepped in to help, too.  The feds set up facilities where addicts can get Rx's for Pelosi-type substitutes to quell their anxiety during withdrawal.  These are called “Wasserman-Shultz” clinics, and just the other day the president introduced the clinic spokesman, Congressman Schultz herself.

 

“She has a cute smile,” Obama said, “…and you want her in your foxhole.”

 

Uh, no, actually we don’t.  What we want is to get through Pelosi-withdrawal, painlessly, if possible.  So bring it, Debbie!  You’re the man! 

 

Pelosi had big shoes to fill, but if the loopy Marxist drool dribbling down Schultz’ chin is any indication, there aren't any feet so big that her mouth couldn’t accommodate them.  Don’t worry, she’ll do fine.

 

And so will we.  Fire in the fox-hole!  2011 just started looking better.

My hmphs! My hmphs! My hmphs!

 

Wednesday is “Hump Day” but I decided to rename today “Hmph Day,” as in “Hmph!  No comment!”  Here’s why:

The typical format for this blog has been to buddy-up a written post with a cartoon.  If a cartoon does its job and hits the target dead-on, what else needs said?

 

More words?  Save your breath. 

 

Hmph! 

 

Comments?

The shelf-life of a weiner cut short

 
 

Congressman Anthony Weiner’s weiner-dangle on twitter makes high school shenanigans seem mature by comparison.  His prank was so infantile it’s hard to believe he sits in a position of high national authority.

That's why it’s hard to resist juvenile commentary about his schnitzel.  I mean, come on, what did he expect?  He got caught with his hand in the nookie jar! 

His supporters are forgiving types, revealing at the same time how their moral GPS needs new batteries.  They say it’s nobody’s business what he does.  Actually, I agree, as long as he keeps his other hand out of the cookie jar.  But I'm pulling my bet off the table.  Based on performance, his track record for trust is last place.

Weiner, do everyone a favor.  Get lost!  If you want to expose yourself, go back to Brooklyn.  There’s a job for you there in seedy buildings with little rooms where horny old goats pay $5 for three minutes to watch perverts squirt mustard on a sausage.

Congressman, you schmuck, you’re an embarrassment.  Get off the national stage.  Your shelf-life just expired.

B.S., the secret to category-5 ratings

 

Memorial Day is history.  Summer’s here, along with two of our most popular seasonal pastimes:  Watching hurricanes and whining about sky-rocketing gas prices.

Fun stuff first.  For sheer lunacy, nothing beats surrealistic images of 150-mph hurricane winds wreaking chaos in the streets of Biloxi or Miami.  Rain-soaked news reporters imitate crash-test dummies dangling in a wind-tunnel, as they dodge Bar-B-Q pits and traffic lights flying overhead.  100 ways to die?  Gets my attention. 

Now the heavy junk.  For raising consumer awareness, what’s better than self-righteous sanctimony at the top of the news hour?  No sooner do vacationers hit the roads, when caravans of media clowns follow, bleating and sputtering in a grand show of outrage about the pain of high pump prices.  Now how gassy is that?

Not to be overlooked, note how the media milks both events for one goal:  to boost ratings.  Oil companies could learn valuable ratings lessons from the television broadcast media.  Take a look at what they have in common:

Television and the oil industry both deliver a product that's consumed by nearly every U.S. citizen, race, creed or sex notwithstanding.  Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets.

Second, both industries use tall, sturdy towers for the extraction and transmission of their products.  One probes the pore spaces of the earth’s crust, while the other penetrates the air space of the earth’s atmosphere.

The most significant similarity is the greatest difference.  The oil industry produces basal sediment (B.S.) and water with its hydrocarbons.  B.S. is a nuisance by-product and state laws required it be disposed.  It’s tolerated as an expense until the disposal costs can no longer be sustained by a well’s declining revenues.  As a rule, B.S. is inversely proportional to an oil producer’s profitability.

Television produces B.S. with its programming, too.  Unlike the oil industry, however, TV isn’t required to treat its B.S. except in extreme cases.  “PG” disclaimers work wonders.  In television, B.S. has a different effect, in that the thicker it gets, the greater the ratings and the more revenues extracted from advertisers.  Now the rule reverses itself – B.S. is directly proportional to a broadcaster’s profitability.

The conclusion?  What’s loss to the producer is sauce to the anchor.  And that’s the way it is.  Have a great summer!

Madonna, Mother of Re-Invention

 

What do stars do after their flames burn-out?  This occurred to me when I stumbled on Christina Aguilera on “The Voice,” a reality show purporting to mentor new vocal talent.   

 

In her prime, Aguilera was a pop singer of modest range.  Her greatest contribution to entertainment was a mesmerizing enactment of a waste management truck with a broken axle backing uphill to dump a load of overripe avocados into a mosh-pit. 

 

By itself, this was enough to guarantee Aguilera a place in history.  But she added pounds, went into rehab and soon was eclipsed by Dame Gaga, a moonbat from a distant galaxy with a penchant for tiaras shaped like intra-uterine devices. 

 

After that it was downhill for Aguilera, but “The Voice” rescued her from descent into irrelevance.

 

Everyone should be so lucky, because sputtering star careers are littered with the debris of desperate efforts to stay forever in public favor.  

 

Some shooting stars burn-out before their time, others hang around long after their sizzle fizzles.  Then there are stars that re-ignite.  Madonna hasn’t produced much lately, but she’s the Mother of Re-Invention and odds are the girl’s got new material.

 

Vincent Van Gouda,

Artist and Critic

Go west, young gators, El Paso is calling

 
Sometimes a feller can be too smart for his own good.

Last week Mr. Mojo was on a roll.  While playing to a delirious crowd in El Paso, the president squirmed seamlessly between academy award-winning posturing for political science majors and pandering shamelessly to wannabe voters.  And just when it couldn't get better, he found a new groove and taunted Republicans to drain the Rio Grande with a flotilla of alligators.

Several days later and a thousand miles east, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers took the extreme measure of opening the Morganza Spillway to divert a rampaging Mississippi River into the Atchafalaya basin.  Baton Rouge and The Big Easy were spared the floodwaters, but the overflow displaced less fortunate folks elsewhere throughout south Louisiana swamplands.

But Cajuns weren't the only ones runnin' through the bayou.  Alligators were in the race for newer digs, too, although they were responding to a different urgency.

Go west, young gators, El Paso is calling!

From the folks who brought down the World Trade Center

  

Woody Hayes, legendary football coach at Ohio State, was known for a play-style characterized as “Three yards and a cloud of dust,” a running game that cranked out short bursts of yardage, rather than the jazzy choreography of 60-yard passes.

 

A few yards here, a few yards there, good enough for Hayes to pile up a 205-61-10 record at OSU, along with 13 Big Ten conference titles and 3 national titles.  Not bad for short bursts.      

 

Hayes’ career ended long ago but his style won followers.  A far-away regime with dark visions of world domination was impressed by Hayes’ sense of industry.  They borrowed heavily from his play-book and embarked on their mission, beginning with reshaping the face of America.  While their vision was grand, success was guaranteed by fastidious adherence to Hayes’ teachings – a few yards here, a few yards there – and the world would be theirs. 

 

A shooting here, a bombing there…an assassination, a threat…the WTC bombing in ’93, the U.S.S. Cole blast in ’99, an unprecedented display on 9/11…and mosques where monuments belong.  Each event not a victory, but a short burst gaining ground.  And they’re piling up yardage.  The U.S. is fertile soil for Islamic colonization.   

 

Far fetched?  Nope.  Thanks mainly to Hollywood, NPR and Joy Behar, a new breed of idiots is helping transform America to reflect the influence of a new breed of fanatical overlords.  A news article last week is testimony to their progress:

 

"Girl pulled from game over concern about headscarf. 

 

"A 12-year old Muslim girl in Maryland was forced to sit out the first half of a basketball game by a referee who said her headscarf was a safety risk.

 

"Seventh-grader Maheen Haq of Hagerstown was allowed to play the second half wearing a hijab after being granted a religious exemption.

 

"The school sports administrator says the girl's parents must provide a letter stating the headscarf is part of their daughter's religion and accept responsibility for any injuries.  She defended the referee's action.

 

"A spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations said there are hijabs with tear-away strips designed for sports that the girl could wear.  He said cases like these can usually be solved with cooperation from both sides."

 

"Hijabs with tear-away strips?"  Thirty years ago this was grist for a John Belushi comic routine on SNL.  Now it's reality at the free-throw line.

 

Not to worry, for America's future dazzles with promise, and nowhere does it dazzle brighter than commerce, where McDonald's, the company that never misses the chance to jangle us with jingles, delights with a new refrain "Goat-meat McNuggets – praise Allah, we lovin' it!"  Or popular culture, with edgy new venues like "Bowling for Burqas."  Or sports, where beheadings bump baseball as the national pastime, and the 7th inning stretch stretches farther to accomodate the evening call to prayer.

 

There you have it, sports-fans, the face of games to come – from the folks who brought down World Trade Center, one story at a time.  You lovin' it?

Dog blogs, bytes and doggerel

 
Ludwig, a black Lab, was bored.  His normal routine – retrieving balls and fetching newspapers – left him unfulfilled.  Ludwig knew he was destined for a loftier purpose:  he wanted to be a poet.  

One evening as his master read the newspaper, the entertainment section caught Ludwig’s attention.  “Poetry-slam – an evening of doggerel.  Bring your best to compete with the rest!”

The competition was that evening, so Ludwig hoofed down to the pub.  While he waited his turn, he listened to the other entrants recite their verse.  “Holy bakin bitz!” Ludwig thought, “these guys are good!  I don’t have a chance!  I gotta get a gimmick!

Ludwig had a popular woof-blog called “Dog Bytes” and many people followed his “barks.”  When it was Ludwig’s turn at the mic, he padded up to the stage and asked the audience to log on to his blog.  Then he pulled out his Blackberry and began texting his entry, an adaption of Pacino’s rant on “Dog Day Afternoon.”

When Ludwig finished, the audience burst into wild applause.  His gamble paid off and Ludwig took first prize.  His bark was verse with a byte.  Arf-arf!

The 111th U.S. Congress, an all-time useless act!

 
The backside of the 1970’s was a rough time without drugs.  A redneck goober from backwater Georgia steered a nervous America into a closet of unexplored anxieties.  Disco dangled on life-support, Zoloft was yet to be discovered, and revisionist historians had not rewritten history.  Life was raw, unvarnished and dark.

Dark, but not without hope, because a beacon of lunacy, “The Gong Show,” hosted by Hollywood madman, Chuck Barris, punctured the national gloom with a showcase of wretched talent and looney mayhem.

Contestants with no noticeable skills (except breathing without a respirator) enchanted TV audiences with acts that were absurd, embarrassing and pointless.

At the end of each act, a panel of judges rated it on a scale of 1-to-10.  Most were abysmal and panel members banged a gong to euthanize the act in its first few seconds... “mercy-gonging” you could say, to relieve audience suffering.  Yet, in rare cases, for a performer who showed talent, The Gong Show launched a show biz career.  But most performers were pitiful and slid back into the basement of obscurity, followed not long after by the Gong Show itself.  
 
History repeats, as if with a blank slate and zero memory.  
 
The backside of the 2000’s was a rough time even with drugs.  A slick-talkin' booger from back alley Chicago shoveled America into a closet of fantasies.  News media swooned, Zoloft was manna from heaven and the nation’s unquenchable thirst for drivel propelled "Snookie," a dead-ringer for Petunia Pig, on a tidal wave of shipwrecks from the Jersey Shore, choking the country in a backwash of debris.
 
Debris yes, but not without hope as the nation tuned in to the “111th Congress,” a shameless cavalcade of pimps, posers and whores led by an opportunistic virus named Nancy Pelosi.
 
The 111th Congress, like The Gong Show, punctured the national psyche with an extravaganza of brazen shenanigans.  The 111th was Pelosi incarnate.  She delighted us with stunning impressions of an inflamed abscess, and promoted Billy May-style infomercials demonstrating how to remove pesky stretch-marks from her version of the truth.  
 
Pelosi dazzled with obtuse wit.  On the health care bill she said, “We have to pass the bill before we can see what’s in it.”  On the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy she said, “You don’t have to be straight to shoot straight."  Never mind being able to see straight.  Gong!
 
Some lawmakers had talent and Congress was a launch pad for criminal careers.  But the majority of lawmakers, like Pelosi, had no talent other than a predisposition for hosing the public.  And like all good things, before long the 111th Congress was gonged out and gone.
 
Pelosi and the 111th – a useless act!  "Be sure you bang your head on the gong when you exit.” 

 

M1 and the business of money

 
 Random thoughts about the business of money.

“M1” is a measure of the total supply of money in circulation.  “M1” is also a semi-automatic rifle that was the standard issue firearm for the US Military.

Coincidence?  Comedian Jack Benny didn’t think so.  When a mugger came up to him and demanded "Your money or your life!” Mr. Benny whipped out his rifle and said “Say hello to my little friend!”

Technically, M1 is the money floating around outside of banks, travelers’ checks, or checking accounts.  If “floating” sounds worrisome, it should.  In one sense, it means the amount of money or time represented by checks in between deposit and payment.  It also means being suspended on the surface of a fluid, like water, without sinking.

If banks want more business, they could give away life preservers to lure customers.  It wouldn't make us safer, but at least they’re creative.

 

A TV ad shows a married couple excited about paying only $3.00 to cash their pay checks at Wal-Mart.  “We’re saving over $200 a year!”  the husband yells with glee. 

 

Hmmm.  Why would anyone use a check-cashing service?  Why not open a bank account and avoid paying all those fees?  What?  Oh, right.  What was I thinking.

 

The business of banks is money.  Getting it.  Making it.  Hiding it.  Making more of it.  Keeping more of ours.  And making it difficult to get any from them.  Like for a loan.  Here's a phone conversation between me (M) and a bank loan officer (B):

 

M:  “Hello?”

 

B:  “Hey, this is Dick Shmuck at Capital Trust.  I just wanted to let you know we rejected your application for a commercial line of credit.”

 

M:  “Oh yeah?  Why?”

 

B:  “Because you don’t have any assets for collateral.”

 

M:  “But the application form only had enough space to write my name and date!  There was no space to list my assets!”

 

B:  “So, without any assets you can understand why you're not a good credit risk.”

 

M:  “But I enclosed a balance sheet with the application.  Didn’t you read it?”

 

B:  “What’s a 'balance sheet'?"

 

M:  “It’s a statement of all my assets and liabilities.  It shows my net worth.”

 

B:  “Well, that proves my point.”

 

M:  “What’s that?”

 

B:  “If you know how much you’re worth, you’re not worth much.  Have a great day and thanks for banking with Capital Trust!”

Attorneys, Bankers and Congress - the ABC's of Grand Larceny

 

Years ago, banks gave away toasters to entice new customers into opening new savings accounts.  This was a clever marketing strategy to teach folks about interest rates and how their savings would grow while they waited for the toast to pop up. 

The campaign didn’t last.  Some new toaster owners apparently believed their savings would double by the time the toast was crisp, and when it didn’t they returned with their toasters to the banks in a grumpy mood and closed their accounts.  Others burnt out the toaster’s heating elements while awaiting the 2% APR to yield its measly yearly fruit.

This was not the last of the banking industry’s wild and wacky schemes to mine our wallets.  After a brief hiatus following the 2008 mortgage-backed meltdown, Harvard-trained MBA’s are back in droves, busy like never before, conjuring up a witch’s brew of new gimmicks for skimming our working capital and enlarging theirs. 

If the anorexic 0.15% yield in my cash account is any indication, they're succeeding wildly. 

And all under the skillful, guiding hands of voodoo practitioners and their minions known as U.S. lawmakers.  If I didn’t know any better, I’d say grand larceny is the holy grail of law and business schools.

Loren Steffy, Houston Chronicle’s only writer with a set of stones, hinted in his business column today about nefarious goings-on between bankers, lawmakers and the Fed.  That was my take, at least.  Read his column about partial deficit-fixing and decide for yourselves.  http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/steffy/7361646.html

My biggest complaint with Steffy is he didn’t just flat-out call them thugs, so his stones aren’t that big.  He’s probably a nice guy though, with a family, and he has to be careful what he writes.  So I’ll help him carry the load:

Shakespeare believed the world would be a safer place if lawyers were all taken out and shot.  During the Great Depression, bankers were regarded with such contempt that Bonnie and Clyde were folk heroes whenever they pulled off a heist.  Humorist Mark Twain once observed “There is no distinctively native American criminal class except Congress.”

So there you have it – Attorneys, Bankers and Congress – the ABC’s of Grand Larceny.  Couldn't have said it better myself.  Happy new year, and here’s a toast to better interest rates for cash accounts in 2011!  And throw in a new toaster while you're at it.

On second thought, make that two toasters, to make up for the crappy interest rates in 2010.

Dreck for success Yo!

 

 

Every culture has a method for measuring success.  The stock market rises and falls with the hemline.  In the ‘60’s when the mini-skirt barely concealed women's upper thighs, the Dow Jones Industrials got regular peeks at a chorus line of steamy summer cuts.  In the ‘70’s the maxi-skirt dropped to the ankles and hid a sulking DJIA and an economic funk that was the trademark of Jimmy Carter’s 4-year experiment with incompetence. 

 

Popular culture measures success by raising the bar of excellence to lower and lower depths.  These days, entertainment splashes around in a subterranean vat of lurid vulgarity where the applause-meter is set to respond only to F-bombs, simulations of sexual congress between primates, and anything that extols the virtues of farts and fecal matter.

 

The downward spiral of popular taste is pioneered by Sarah Silverman, a faux comedienne who excavated a career from the lower colon of banality by imitating a turd.  Or listen to the Grammy-winning song “F-ck You” a witty ditty performed by a 3rd-tier gargler named “Cee Lo Green,” frequently mistaken for “See Mo’ Green,” not far wrong considering his "song" had 30 million hits on YouTube.

 

“Hits,” as you probably know, is 21st century buzz for saying a performer laughs all the way to the bank while others calm their stomachs with Tums.  Art is a reflection of the culture that burps it up.  One reason heart-burns like these gain in popularity is because the majority of pop culture consumers think style means class.  Well, there you go.  Urp! 

 

Earlier this year a young lady peeled off her panties for a vid-cam and plopped her bootay into a gooey cake.  The video was a stupefying visual of dimpled flesh squirming in chocolate mousse, topped with a game-ending – ta-DAH! – fart.  If hits on YouTube is a criteria, then performance art saw its finest entry, ever.  The girl’s act can still be seen on CakeFarts.com, but it got 20 million hits before it was banned on YouTube.

 

Fashion editor John Malloy wrote a column called “Dress for Success,” where he stated the highway to fame was paved with a natty wardrobe.  OLD school alert!  The NEW school yardstick is the Yiddish word “dreck,” code-word for cheap, worthless, trash, or more to the point, shit.  Dreck for success Yo!  C’mon!  We know you want it!  15 million hits of fame is yours for the drecking.  

 

Vincent Van Gouda, artist & critic

Smoke dreams: free-falling through fog-colored glasses

 

Long ago I regularly stuffed my body with substances that didn’t belong there.  Exotic stuff like Acetylpyrazine, alpha-Amylcinnamaldehyde, Butyl Phenylacetate, Bisabolene, Maltodextrin, 3,7-Dimethyl-6-Octenoic Acid, Isoamyl Benzoate, for example.

 

Primary ingredients for LSD or marijuana?

 

No, just some of the 200+ chemical ingredients in nicotine.

 

If nicotine sounds lethal, it is.  So lethal that it’s been used as a pesticide for centuries.  But when we’re young, we’re the bullet-proof heirs-apparent to the indisputable truth that we're omnipotent and we could withstand the toxic consequences of our bad decisions.

 

People say they smoke because they enjoy it.  It relaxes them.  Maybe so.  Scientists found that nicotine elevates the levels of a neurotransmitter called dopamine in the parts of the brain that produce feelings of pleasure and reward.  Good a reason as any to smoke.

 

Next month is a personal milestone – I'm celebrating 20 years since I filed a restraining order against cigarettes.  People ask me, “Don’t you miss cigarettes?”  Well, no, that’s why I quit smoking – so I’d no longer yearn for the abuse.

 

Y’see, nicotine is addicting and I didn’t smoke for enjoyment.  Fact is, I wasn’t even aware most of the time I smoked.  I just mindlessly lit up and puffed one after the other.  Why?  Dopamine, remember?  I smoked because I was a dope.  See the connection?

 

People say it’s easy to quit smoking.  I agree.  It’s so easy to quit that I quit more than a hundred times, before I quit quitting and actually quit.

 

Nicotine addiction is like a dream where one free-falls through life with fog-colored glasses and cigarettes produce a smoke screen to block the healthy rays of emotional growth and awareness.  Addictive behavior traces its roots to core issues.  Becoming a non-smoker begins a process of recovery where we have the chance to discover the glitches and fix them.

 

After 20 years in a smoke-free zone I had my “Ah-hah!” moment.  I learned that I wasn't hooked on nicotine at all.  My Jones of choice was – ta-DAH! – avoidance.

 

Cigarettes are the perfect complement for avoiding unpleasant stuff.  Don’t like the way someone looked at you?  Puff!  Didn’t get that promotion?  Puff-puff!  Put on hold for an hour while trying to get through to a customer service rep?  Puff-puff-puff!

 

I kicked the cigarette habit, but the avoidance monkey is still on my back.  Even after 20 years.  This post was scheduled to publish ten days ago (notice the date on the cartoon), but didn't make it.  The topic I set out to expose as the core of my addiction - avoidance - is what prevented me from making the deadline.

 

Maybe it's too soon to celebrate. 

Low on memory

 

Actor Guy Pearce starred in “Memento,” a quirky film about a man who survived a horrific personal loss.  The trauma of the loss prevented him from forming new memories, so he used a Polaroid camera to record people and events, otherwise he’d forget them almost immediately afterward. 

 

Polaroid eventually went out of business, so Guy bought a digital camera.  One day while he was busy taking pictures the camera stopped working.  The LED read “Out of Memory.”  Guy couldn’t get a break.

 

If we are what we have, when we lose what we have, what are we then?  If we are what we remember, as long as we remember then at least we still are.  But if all we have is memories, when we lose those, what we have then is lost and so are we.

 

Wait, hold the phone!  Where’s this going?  I thought I knew, but now I’m lost.  Must be low on memory.

 

Vincent Van Gouda, artist & critic

The Bayou City's "red-light" districts

 
“Billy the Exterminator” answered America’s call to fumigate congress.  He did a bang-up job.  Waded in with spray-guns a-blazin’ and cleared the streets for a posse of conservatives chomping at the bit to repave the American dream.

Will conservatives succeed in restoring order?  If some of the talk-show effluvia we're hearing is a sign of things to come, I’m not convinced they got our back.  

Joe "Pags" Pagliarulo, morning host on Houston’s 950 AM radio, has opinions I share more often than not.  It’s hard to disagree with someone who favors teaching English in U.S. public schools, rather than Macaw, the language of choice for Asian Gray Parrots.

Yet Pags has other opinions that worry me, like his opposition to "red light cameras."  Last month he interviewed 950’s news director who reported “science is in for red light cameras.” 

Really?  Medical science has been trying unsuccessfully for over 60 years to find a cure for cancer and he’s sayin’ after only 4 years we have “science” on red light cameras?

 

To illustrate, he cited an example of a guy tooling along in his auto who looks up suddenly and says, “Oh my goodness – a red light camera!” then slams on his brakes and gets rear-ended by an F-350 traveling behind him at Mach-3.

 

The “science” says red light cameras caused the accident. 

 

Really?  So what was the driver doing that he didn’t notice the light?  Day-dreaming about the exotic lap-dancer who gave him a boner at Rick’s Cabaret?  And what was he gonna do if the camera wasn't there?  Run the red light?  And the dope who rear-ended him?  Traffic court calls that “failure to maintain a safe distance.”  Sorry, boneheads, you got what you deserve.

 

Now stop it, Pags!  That's not science, that's just statistics, like the kind of junk Al Gore flushes down the commode.  Here’s more crap masquerading as fact in the flotilla of faux science:

 

Red light cameras deprive drivers of due process:  And red light runners who T-bone a school bus, maim a bunch of kids and deprive them of quality of life?  That’s of no consequence?  Since when do you get to pick and choose?      

 

Red light cameras violate privacy rights:  Nope.  When we go public, we waive our right to privacy.  It’s called “the social contract” – we have a duty to act, and drive, in a manner that respects others.  Only self-absorbed narcissists believe their right to privacy trumps everyone else’s right to safety.

 

Red light cameras are a money-grab:  Nope again.  It’s a user-tax.  If you don’t run red lights, why do you care?  Besides, somebody’s gotta pay for cleaning up the carnage in the intersections.  Might as well be those who cause the mess.

 

There's more, but enough!  Houston voters chugged the juice, voted “No” on Prop 3 and kicked red light cameras to the curb.  Okay, point made, Houston, now start your engines.  Run red lights!   Make our city's streets safe for prima donnas and NASCAR wannabes.

 

Here’s what’s weird.  Pags and 950 AM are the standard bearers for conserving American values, yet they're oblivious to how their position does little for preserving Houston lives.  Guys!  You had me fooled.  I almost thought you cared.

 

Next time “Billy the Exterminator” returns to clean up – and he will in 2012 – I sure hope it's someone else’s mangled carcass he finds in unprotected intersections, not mine.