From The Virginian Pilot
By Daryl Lease

I do hope John McCain still has Phil Gramm’s number. He owes the former Texas senator an apology and maybe even a guest spot in his next “Hot Chicks Dig Obama” campaign commercial.

It’s been a month now since McCain’s campaign gave its co-chairman the bum’s rush for indelicately describing America as “a nation of whiners” who constantly grouse about how bad the economy is.

“You’ve heard of mental depression,” Gramm explained, slowly enough for all of us who don’t have a doctorate in economics to understand. “This is a mental recession.”

McCain, who was presumably preoccupied with the early stages of formulating his innovative Barack-Obama-is-too-popular-to-win campaign strategy, chose not to defend his old friend.

Instead, McCain declared that, by golly, the U.S. economy really is “in shambles.” And, as a point of clarification, he added, “Phil Gramm does not speak for me. I speak for me.”

Well, it turns out old Phil was right, sort of. The economy’s not so bad.

The truth is, our stomachs are plump, our faces are smeared with chocolate, our lungs are filled with the satisfying cloud of toxic smoke, and all of us - more or less - are blotto.

Read more Too Blotto

From The S.F. Chronicle
By Mark Morford

Researchers are reporting that an experimental drug can mimic the results of an exercise regimen — with no exercise required. [Called “the couch potato experiment,”] after four weeks of taking the pill, mice who hadn’t worked out displayed a 44 percent increase in their running endurance. —Wired

1. Scientists at the Ronald Wilson Reagan School for Pschyoeconomic Paroxysms have reportedly developed a new drug that, after just a few weeks, induces random bouts of forgetfulness combined with the ability to reverse ideological direction in an instant, most notably when large amounts of cash are placed directly in front of the face.

Code-named “the McCain,” users report random outbreaks of very bad jokes coupled with an extremely combative nature, acute desire to detonate large explosive devices across multiple desert nations and a general feeling that the real problem with the world today is all the gul-dang gay young peacenik whippersnapper environmentalists who like to rub their iPods all over their Googles. Common prescription: “Take two McCains and call me in 1957.”

2. Following research at Harvard and McGill universities where scientists have been testing new drugs that “delete” bad memories, researchers in Washington, D.C., have found a new compound that tricks the brain into believing great progressive accomplishments are being made and tremendous strides have been taken to reverse all sorts of previous damage, when in fact very little has been done and mostly what’s happening is a lot of general whimpering wrapped in a great many false gestures, all while promising even more super-positive changes ahead, but if only someone really good steps in as leader and tells everyone what to do.

Read more New Drugs

From The Virginian-Pilot
By Daryl Lease

“Federal agents may take a traveler’s laptop computer or other electronic device to an off-site location for an unspecified period of time without any suspicion of wrongdoing, as part of border search policies the Department of Homeland Security recently disclosed.”

“WHATCHA got there, Mitchell?”

“Another laptop, Wilson. The fellow carrying it was bellyaching about the airline charging seven bucks for a blanket and a pillow. So I nabbed him.”

“Sounds like he’s a potential menace to the homeland. Good work. Finding anything interesting on his computer?”

“Well, I turned up an e-mail cleverly hidden in a folder marked ’spam.’ It’s from the son of a deposed Nigerian prince asking for help wiring $21 million to a U.S. bank account.”

“Aaah, so he’s associating with Nigerians, is he? Interesting, interesting. Remind me: Are the Nigerians for or against us in the war on terror?”

“Against, I think. Or maybe for. To tell you the truth, I have an awful hard time keeping track.”

“Me, too. You’d better copy the e-mail. I don’t like the sound of it. Anything else?”

“A video with Paris Hilton in it.”

“Wonderful! We’ll detain him on obscenity charges.”

Read more Secrets

From The S.F. Chronicle
By Mark Morford

Sure, you could start with an open-palmed apology, a profoundly contrite on-your-knees sort of thing, maybe an open letter in your local paper or a heartfelt speech at your next dinner party whereby you stumble though some sort of “I don’t know what the hell I was thinking” or “I must’ve been blind” or “Wow, that mescaline sure was potent” type of defense for your unfortunate and reprehensible choices.

But the fact is, that’s not really gonna cut it.

Of course, you could do the obvious thing and cast your vote in November for Barack Obama, but even I know that’s probably asking too much — and besides, all signs indicate a potential landslide for Obama anyway, given the unprecedented worldwide rush of positive energy, the tremendous cosmic craving for intelligent and new and ingenuous, coupled with a deep undercurrent of karmic revulsion toward the wonky, bloodthirsty agenda of grandpa McCain.

So then, what can you do, all you increasingly humiliated, disillusioned, deeply mistaken Bush voters? How can you, having hopefully realized by now the violent error of your ways, take steps both small and large to try and make amends for shoving Dubya down the throat of the world, for your tiny but oh so poisonous contribution to the worst and most demeaning eight years in modern American politics?

First, let’s be clear: As tempting as it is, I do not suggest some grand humiliating gesture, some sweetly demeaning spectacle whereby you must dye your hair blue and run naked through the streets of rural Alabama waving a rainbow flag and carrying a bottle of fresh stem cells as you suddenly claim to care deeply about blue fin tuna and Brazilian rain forests and honest sex ed for teens. Unless you really want to.

Read more Pay Up

From The Pgh Post Gazette
By Tony Norman

Moved to anger by a recent political spot on the Internet drawing sly parallels between Barack Obama and the Antichrist — the John McCain campaign Web ad “The One” — the Real Antichrist(TM) 666 wrote to the Republican’s political operation. He complained of copyright infringement.

His cease-and-desist letters, addressed to the candidate, were obtained by this column’s investigative unit. Obviously, his identity could not be fully verified by deadline yesterday:

“To the Honorable Sen. John McCain, hapless tool of the Republican corporatist machine and inadvertent blasphemer of all that Christian fundamentalists hold sacred:

“Please allow me to introduce myself. For security reasons, I can only give you the titles I’m known by in sacred literature. I’m the Beast, the Angel of the Bottomless Pit, the Adversary, Damien, the Man of Sin, the Son of the Morning, the Ultimate Scofflaw and the Antichrist 666.

“It has come to our attention as we prepare your world for the Great Tribulation that will follow the eight years of plagues and locusts of the Bush Tribulation Cycle that one of our innovative political spots — specifically the Internet ad campaign ‘The One’ — has been appropriated by your admirably nefarious political operation and remixed for domestic consumption.

Read more Wealth and Taste

From CounterPunch
By Robert Fantina

Just in time to sabotage Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s signature issue, President George Bush is happily proclaiming progress in Iraq. Mr. Bush has always counted on the voters to have a short memory, and he apparently sees no reason to alter that view now. His statements rely on it.

For example, this week he made this announcement: “Violence is down to its lowest level since the spring of 2004, and we’re now in our third consecutive month with reduced violence levels holding steady.”

One might be tempted to ask the president about the levels of violence prior to the U.S. invasion. Certainly, an enterprising reporter from one of the few newspapers or magazines whose owners do not benefit from Mr. Bush’s policies that are disastrous for the average citizen might broach that query. Violence is down, compared to the last few years, but it is still astronomically higher than the time period before 130,000 U.S. soldiers invaded.

He also made this statement: “A significant reason for this sustained progress is the success of the surge.” One must remember that the addition of 30,000 troops to terrorize the citizens of Iraq was not an escalation, but a surge. Be that as it may, it seems to have been sufficient to kill sufficient numbers of Iraqis to reduce the amount of open opposition to the occupying army. This, apparently, is Mr. Bush’s definition of success.

A day earlier, a major offensive was begun in Diyala. Said Mr. Bush: “This operation is Iraqi-led; our forces are playing a supporting role.” Thus, with U.S. military support, the Iraqis are fighting the Iraqis. Does Mr. Bush not know what a civil war is? Perhaps it doesn’t matter as long as the U.S. gets the oil.

Read more Redefining

From The S.F. Chronicle
By Mark Morford

This is my dream. It is but a humble vision, completely reasonable, also very, very American in its blatant love of large amounts of unnecessary crap combined with a screaming disregard for anything resembling tact or humility or the simple act of, let’s say, tasteful restraint.

It unfolds thusly: I stroll the city streets, enter humbly into a cafe, or maybe a bookstore, boutique, log cabin, museum, dog kennel, crematorium. It does not matter, for wherever I happen to be, I will surely see something I want.

Perhaps it is that shirt you’re wearing, or your shoes. Perhaps it is that nice ring, or your coffee mug, or your haircut or your contact lenses or your nipple implants or your charming effervescent smile, your small intestine, that painting, the bathroom tile or that used syringe right there on the floor.

What the thing is, of course, does not matter. All that matters is that I like it. And, as a devout American consumer, if I like it, of course that means I want it. If I want it, of course that means I must have it. And if I must have it, well, I must have it right now. What, you’re gonna make me wait? The hell you are. Then the terrorists win.

Here is where it gets all dreamy: All I do now is reach out and touch the object in question, feel its must-havedness shoot through my sweaty, desirous fingertips.

Immediately I feel a vibration deep in my loins as a small bolt of electricity is pumped straight into my cerebral cortex, igniting a short-lived but totally delicious boost in serotonin, right along with another small hole in my credit rating. In other words, I feel really good, but only for a second.

Read more Buying

From The S.F. Chronicle
By Mark Morford

It is, of course, all a matter of scale. Perspective. Of allowing yourself and your sensibilities to be hammered to a bloody pulp by the hard fist of gluttonous reality, just for fun, and see if you can walk away with a shrug and a smile and without feeling like running off to the woods with a case of absinthe and a copy of “Sailing to Byzantium,” never to return.

You might think you’re helping, doing what you can, assisting the healing of the world in tiny but essential ways. You cut down on your garbage and buy compact fluorescent lightbulbs and respond appropriately to the giant polluting scam that is bottled water. You recycle and buy local and eat organic and maybe even compost, watch your mileage, choose carefully, tread lightly, vote accordingly, use a nice little reusable canvas shopping bag at Trader Joe’s. Sweet.

Reality flips you off

And then, well, it all just explodes. Reality - or rather, a certain nasty aspect of it - spits on your shoes and flips you off and lumbers away like a fat bully after stomping all over your cool sand castle at the beach. I love it when that happens. I hate it when that happens. Ain’t it just the way?

I hit the fabulous Vegas Strip recently, and it was a sharp and wonderful lesson, a reminder, a slap in the heart of all you think might be changing, shifting, improving.

I’ve been to Vegas plenty of times, but it’s always an astounding thing, the scale, the overkill, the energy usage, the sheer impudence of the place, excessive waste like a mantra, fresh water sucked into the void of the scalding desert, air conditioning blasting and gargantuan everything as a million European and Asian tourists flock to the place to indulge in distinctly American fantasies of greed and consumption, all thanks to our pathetically weak dollar and wicked extant ethos of more, more, more.

Read more Have a Drink

From The Virginian Pilot
By Daryl Lease

“Former White House adviser Karl Rove on Monday defended his defiance of a congressional subpoena, saying he’s offered lawmakers other ways to question him about allegations of political pressure at the Justice Department.” — The Associated Press, July 14 Somewhere deep in the Hampton Roads-Bridge Tunnel …

“Where the devil are we, driver?”

“We’re stuck in traffic, Mr. Rove.”

“I can see that. We’re going to be late for Rep. Thelma Drake’s fundraiser in Virginia Beach.”

“I’ll give them a call to warn them, sir.”

“OK, but no need to worry her. Tell her that it was the president’s idea for me to show up fashionably late. She’ll just nod and smile. She never disagrees with the president. He could put an oil rig on the Boardwalk, and she’d just nod and smile.”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Rove.”

“Say, have you noticed we’re surrounded by tiny little hybrid cars with ‘Obama ’08’ bumper stickers?”

“Would you like me to turn off my headlights, sir? That way you won’t see them.”

“Won’t be necessary. My, that’s odd: They’re all getting out of their tiny hybrid cars. And they’re coming this way! There must be dozens of them!”

“I’m alerting Homeland Security, sir! The Navy should be here in no time!”

Read more Tunnel Torture

From The Seattle PI
By Reg Henry

On behalf of the whiner community, I would like to say a few characteristically depressing words about the economy.

As former Sen. Phil Gramm said recently, whiners like myself are having a mental recession when it comes to the economy. I have to admit this is true. My mentality long ago receded so much it took my hair with it.

Just this week I did a bit of whining when I looked at my retirement investments and realized that I will have to work for perhaps another 30 years past my projected retirement date. While I love all of you very much, I was rather hoping you could tell yourself jokes in a few years so I can go fishing.

Of course, that assumes there will be a newspaper industry to work in. Fortunately, we in the nation’s word factories are reinventing ourselves every day in new and exciting ways.

For example, I have suggested to management that we use our circulation system to deliver breakfast pizzas with news printed on the box. Our motto could be: “All The News That’s Fit to Eat.” In fact, we could change our name to the Pittsburgh Pepperoni-Gazette, in which case our motto could be “One of America’s Great Napkins.”

Unfortunately, it’s not just the word factories that are hurting. It seems that every industry has its problems, with the possible exception of the repossession industry. But to say this is to contribute to the gloom and doom that apparently is the only brake on the Bush administration’s economic plans from taking flight on the wings of eagles. (Or turkeys.) Today I want to apologize for any excessive, recessive mental doubting on my part that may have caused the sub-prime mortgage crisis, the problems at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the wholesale export of jobs overseas, through-the-roof gas prices, the devalued dollar and the failed IndyMac Bancorp, which had the bad manners to have its assets seized just after Mr. Gramm blamed all the economic bad news on Whiner Nation.

Read more Whiner Nation