• woo hoo! RNC time-at least until project runway -tonight’s dumb show is called “reform”! or - “we still won’t call them ‘people of color’” #
• filtafry! http://snurl.com/3mqke we clean cooking oil! #
• “siren song of change” - stop talking about bush #
• “let’s stop all this hope nonsense and vote for mccain who has no hope” #
• “he will not apologize for america’s strength but stuff it down their throats” #
• somebody has a “clean coal” basebal cap - why couldn’t they afford decent signs? #
• luis fortun-yo wishes the crowd “buenos noches” - the crowd does not whoop and holler back #
• i think he though the “crack down on the oil speculation” line would get some applause but SURPRISE it didn’t #
• does anybody know if these country songs are popular ? #
• wow - you realy CAN be anything you want to be even IF you grew up in the suburbs! #
• umm…meg - wanna speculate on why we’re in such bad shape? #
• we’ll make it easier to take the tax deductions on your seven houses #
• ooh! a campaign commercial! #
• @WickedStepmom oh, man - get used to it - my fifteen year old JUST stopped and i had to make a deal to get THAT done #
• YAY! We’re going to finally cure chronic diseases! #
• i wonder if mccain will start with curing face cancer first #
• hee hee - everyday people! “there is a white one/who wants to help the white one…” #
• did they REALLY mute the verses on “everyday people”?? #
• faux fifties music cuz everything was faux better back in the 50’s #
• playing footloose now - the movie where the repressed kevin bacon dances on a car to buck his repression #
• @FakeSarahPalin harper valley pta is my vote! or “janie’s mom’s got it going on” #
• man - she REALLY know john mccain really, really well! #
• new slogan - ” #
• new slogan - “John McCain - He Knows Evil” #
• guess it’s going badly enough they had to do a little prayer break #
• “country first” grrrrrrr #
• “drill, baby, drill” that’s just so wrong on so many levels - using 60’s black radical slogans to rape the environment #
• dude - it’s the republicans that are taking your rights away, you idiot #
• will romney say “i take back every bad thing i said about john mccain” #
• romney - “John Mccain will change the rotation of the earth around the sun” #
• “we have a prescription for america…but you can’t affford it because you don’t have health insurance” #
• can you be “blessed” with family values? i thought you practiced family values #
• didn’t clinton start work-to-welfare? #
• “time for big ideas and not big brother” - gimme a fucking break - you can’t be that stupid #
• my god - al gore’s jet? is that the best you can do? #
• “John McCain - He Knows Evil” #
• @TSDivaDani normally, yes, but today they got a waiver from alex jones to NOT be big brother until after the convention #
• america is the hope of the earth and heliocentrism is an atheistic document #
• some asshole is dress up like mini-me doing abe lincoln #
• how is henry kissenger still alive? #
• the huckster…um…wait…bad nickname for him - gimme a sec and i’ll think of something better #
• man - he’s gotta get a new gag writer - “tackier than a costume change at a madonna concert” - he can do better than that #
• oh - i LOVE this anecodte he’s telling! #
• and i know this story is true…because *I* knew the soldiers - http://snurl.com/3mrei - deck of cards #
• hey - do the ‘Licans have a a hawaain, too? #
• (i’m calling them the ‘Lican Party until they stop calling us the Democrat Party) #
• this is the worst resume ever! “Sarah Palin was one of the best staplers in the office” #
• @QueenofSpain you’re hired!! #
• palin eloped, it’s said, because she was pregnant…just like her daughter #
• it’s really important to have a VP that comfortable in her own skin #
• “sarah palin will not try to re-invent herself during this campaign…like John McCain has” #
• @QueenofSpain tell you what - you can be the governor of hbee island #
• @nprpolitics huckabee is like red buttons - you’d rather watch somebody else but he’s ok - i’d heard a lot of his line before on the stump #
• wassilla is like the cheers bar, i guess #
• (hey - whoever is slowing down the c-span streaming - stop it - *laffin*) #
• i love the irony of ‘Licans chanting “zero, zero” #
• lyndon johnson?? WTF? #
• soooo….sarah makes up for the fact that mccain has no governing expirience? #
• jesus - they’re scraping the bottom of the barrel comparing electoral votes and how many delawares can dance on the head of a pin #
• note to feminists - voting for a woman is really more important than voting your beliefs #
• i know sarah palin and you, sir, are no sarah palin #
• @FakeSarahPalin another song idea - sarah by bob dylan - it’s really long so if trig starts acting up you’ll have some extra time #
• i think jamie lynn..errrr…bristol just showed up #
• hey - isn’t this the kind of east-coast egghead that romney was trashing earlier? #
• well…just missed most of guiliiani’s speach because our house got toilet papered as a hazing for Varsity Soceer #
• i’ll say it again - mccain will NOT release the names of his cabinet if the gooks invade america and capture him #
• guiliani is hacking other speaker’s material #
• “democrats will not address the issues that we do really well on!” #
• shouldn’t we be insulting terrorists? #
• ich bin ein georgian #
• we need to stop looking at things morally like obama does #
• jesus - cspan just had the perfect arayan grunting USA USA #
• how can guiliani, the former mayor of NYC, disparage “comsopolitain” and “flashiness” #
• omg - rudy just played the gender card - let’s ask his ex-wives about sexism #
• “president? oh, yah, you betcha - i’ll be there in a jif” #
• @FakeSarahPalin you’re killin’ me!! #
• “our nominee could be compared to kennedy if kennedy were a republican” #
• for a good time, follow @FakeSarahPalin - she’s milf-riffic! #
• our family is just like the spears family - just plain folks #
• todd…couldn’t you have shaved, buddy? #
• “we met in high school and he knocked me up and we ran off together” #
• really - she was the wife in fargo #
• let’s remember what happened the last time we elected the guy you’d like to have a beer with #
• who did they just cart away?? #
• let’s elect jeff at the 7/11 president #
• ohhhh, she’s gonna be VP AND getting dinner on the table by six! #
• @nprpolitics who got carted away - any idea? they showed it on c-span #
• @tibbon ummm…that’s kinda of the point i was driving at *laffin* #
• palin’s about to quote “the load-out” #
• victory is JUST AROUND THE CORNER…AGAIN…and he wants to quit #
• i’m getting really depressed - she tells lies and they hoot and holler like…well, sorry…retards #
• @Stranahan russ meyer! HA! #
• @eqdj give me three specifics #
• since when was serving your community so horrible? #
• @eqdj i’m asking you - gimme three specifics #
• @adamjschmidt awww…i know - i’m not unsympathetic, buddy - i don’t think i was that kind to the dems, either #
• last one out of the auditorium, please turn off the flag #
• mccain hacks obama by showing up after the vp speach #
• @adamjschmidt those are two different concepts - i’ve performed drunk and killed - speeches don’t mean anything, according to obama haters #
• @adamjschmidt i think this “can she do both” is bogus - “is she qualified” is not a bogus question #
• “please remain standing…gentlemen, remove your hats” #
• some kind of republican performance art #
• “indivisible” - OMG…too perfect #
• hooo - we’re raising mccain - the mcguy that killed his mcbrother #
• @eqdj no examples? #
• i love how the breeze through the “hearing no objection” and don’t stop to wait for the nays #
• praying that someone starts a chant of “alan keye, alan keyes” #
• ALAN KEYES!!! #
• damn - 11:17pm and i get my first “give the RNC more money” email #
• @eqdj again - i’m asking YOU - not sure why you’re balking on the question #
• okey doke - i’ve got to run to the store #
• uh oh - trouble in the religious right - dobson to be picketed by anti-abortion group http://snurl.com/3msej #
• @eqdj so you can’t come up with three examples - it’s an easy question #
• @danchoi stars=celebrites? laffin #
• um…sarah palin is the next ronald reagan? - http://snurl.com/3msum #
• @newmediajim so will we see you on the Pentagon Channel? #
• http://snurl.com/3mwhs - palin’s response to right-wing “survey” for gov in ‘06 - “if one nation under good good enuf for founding fathers.. #
• @gwfrink3 heh - some guy last night kept saying RNC was fact based not emo based but wouldn’t provide examples #
• @QueenofSpain cnn…the place for grills #
• @MarilynM hey - pat boone recorded “wang dang taffy apple tango” too, which no black artist would ever DREAM of covering #
• @donlemoncnn palins speech was a hatchet job meant solely to rehash lies, hide the truth and get the faithful hooting and grunting for blood #
• @baratunde i’m pretty sure that jesus got the best drugs #
• @BaghdadBrian amen to that - all you can get from a speech is whether the person is a good speaker and is/has a good writer #
• sweet peace - my house has no children in it! #
• @tibbon that was a lowlight for me - how the rnc insists that dnc MUST discuss precisely the same issues or they are evil personified #
• http://snurl.com/3n2wm - “When asked about evil, Obama mentioned Darfur and child abuse—both standard liberal answers” #
• i love how the ‘Licans keep saying “true american hero” like they’re asking for a fight #
• writing meeting tonight - hopefully will be home b4 McAble - looks like rather than “peace” the theme is “leave sarah aloooooooone” #

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• Still in the mall from hell…not sure if i’ll ever get…feel like i.ve morphed to 13yr old #
• Lights in mall going out….hearing the baying of wolves #
• oy - home from the mall - WTF with the fucking reagan tribute - is it zombie reagan?? #
• AH! reagan=maverick mccain=maverick reagan=mccain #
• all right - i’ll go back later and watch how reagan’s soul jumped into mccain and listen to how palin can field dress a moose #
• john mccain has already survived one economic scandal..is that what they mean by “tested”? #
• cindy just said to her kids “everybody wave” #
• mccain’s mom apparently has more balls than mccain himself #
• “john mccain was treated like a gitmo prisoner and we should elect him president as a special treat” #
• john mccain will NEVER reveal the names of his cabinet to the gooks if he’s ever captured again!! GO MCCAIN!! #
• @agustarz um…you might say that *laffin* #
• JOHN MCCAIN IS 123FT TALL!! HE’LL BE OUR TALLEST PRESIDENT!! #
• “a man who never quits is never defeated” a man who stands never sits down…a man who dead is fred thompson #
• kill the belligerant ruskies commies!! #
• “it’s time to make the democrats stop acting like democrats and more like republicans!” #
• HOO! FT is so FOLKSY he MUST be telling the truth! #
• there are whole sections of the auditorium that look empty there - @nprpolitics - is that right or am i just hopeful? #
• JOHN MCCAIN CAN’T SALUTE THE FLAG??? LMAO! #
• awww…they tried to get a weak lil USA/USA chant going and couldn’t even do that #
• repubs are waving yellow flags…of cowerdice? #
• @nprpolitics when is fred thompson speaking? *laffin* #
• RNC wackiness - texas delgation all raising their cowboy hats at more or less the same time! Kah-RAZE-zee!! #
• lieberman - thank you SO MUCH for the thirty pieces of sliver #
• lieberman - washington said no parties which means no democrats #
• you’re not a fucking democrat, joe - go fuck yourself #
• @lesliecarbone hah! love it! #
• being a dem or repub is important…but..HUH?? WTF is he talking about??? #
• john s. mccain - the “s” stands for ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss #
• “it doesn’t matter that i’m lying when i say i’m a democrat - what’s important is that you PRETEND that i’m a democrat” #
• “my democratic friends know that john mccain voted 95% of the time with bush and they should stop trying to say that’s not maverick” #
• @ayse just offensive #
• HAHA! i’m a democrat that just trashed michael moore to appeal to my new masters #
• @adamjschmidt ok - i’ll give you that one - but i’ve never seen the repubs refute that number #
• @adamjschmidt wapo says 88.3% voted with party http://snurl.com/3mfdc #
• “we set it up so that it LOOKS like there are more troops coming home then there actually are!” #
• @MackCollier listen to focus on the family or http://www.crosstalkamerica.com #
• “you maybe thinking about voting for hillary clinton but you should vote for john mccain” #
• did lieberman just say to vote for dennis kucinich?? #
• @baratunde does “america first” work for “country first”? #
• back to back jews! i guess that’s progress, huh? #
• um…aren’t you supposed to ask about nays too? #
• so - all who watched the first two hours - is it worth going back? #
• @baratunde does the adopted kids count? #
• c-span’s lines are jammed! #
• aaaaand the ubiquitous ron paul call on c-span #
• just listen to fox news sunday basically ripping mccain on the palin choice - gotta say i was kinda shocked #
• @phillymac i’ve gotten on gallagher and medved a couple of times…pretty amusing - gallagher asked me if i wore birkenstocks #
• i just saw some guy on the floor of the rnc dressed in 1920’s golf clothing #
• last one out of the rnc, please turn off the flag #
• prolly old but - rubber johnny video - you’ve been warned - http://snurl.com/3mgmm #
• can you push a YouTube feed into iTunes that’ll push into an iPod? #
• @stevegarfield well, at least 1,8923 views now! great video! #
• Retweeting @stevegarfield figured out (w/no help from MA) it costs 59 Cents to mail your absentee ballot in MA- http://twurl.nl/qy8p71 #
• Boston Herald has palin w/high power rifle and the headline “BACK OFF” - guess that’s the new strategy - threats http://snurl.com/3mkan #
• http://www.tweetdeck.com is fine but too big - think i’ll stick with twhirl #
• @mikedoe that’d be great to see palin and company on jerry springer after they lose #
• @Mobasoft feedburner does a decent job for iTunes - but you’re prolly way beyond that #
• school starts tomorrow and i get my house back!! #
• wow - http://www.crosstalkamerica.com isn’t even talking about the RNC today! that’s pretty fricking amazing #
• kind of miss right-click|refresh on chrome #
• i love how vcy passes out radios in sudan that ONLY get the christian radio station they broadcast #
• @blogdiva doesn’t count because he’s not on the floor - RNC still 100% white #
• just saw an ad that has palin seemingly running against obama #
• c-span re-running thompson’s “pow-s make better presidents” speech #
• in my perfect world, briston palin is forced to apologize to every single american for being a bad person #
• Drug and alcohol meeting @ high school - who’s more bored? Me or daughter? #
• “thanks for coming to this manditory meeting” #

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“Oh, boo hoo.  Boo boo hoo.  The “MSM” really should leave Sarah Palin and her pregnant daughter alone because her failure to raise her child with the values she insists that others have should not be part of the debate about whether she’s a good VP pick.”

Um.  No.

Sarah Palin is unfit for VP because she is an unfit mother for throwing her pregnant daughter to the wolves of the press rather than politely asking for a rain check.  For anyone, especially Palin, to act shocked and surprised that her knocked up 17yr old became an issue shows a lack of understanding about politics that makes me shudder.  And IF McCain knew about it BEFORE he picked her - what the FUCK was he thinking?  Are the ‘Lican Party (and that’s my new response to the whole “Democrat Party” crap) truly planning on hiding behind a pregnant 17yr old to deflect criticism of their miserable policies?  “We’re here to talk about the fact that our healthcare policy sucks and the press just wants to talk about sex, sex, sex…as USUAL!  Next question about Gov. Palin’s daughter, please.”  Just when you thought they’d hit bottom…oy.

The ConChrists took a little bit of time to work out their response but they settled on an old chestnut - “Oh.  So NOW the left-wing commie media is concerned about ‘family values’. They never were BEFORE.”

*sigh*

For any folks NOT in the choir, let me explain something to you.  The left-wing commie media STILL doesn’t care about “family values”.  That’s not the issue.  The issue is that YOU, the fellaters of Dobson, the eater’s Rick Warren’s sperm, the stormtroopers of Chuck Hagee, don’t care about family values, either.  If Obama’s daughters (provided they were older) got knocked up, your flaming sword would lop off his head and the heads of his family and call it “justice”.  You would crow from the rooftops that that here was the proof that giving condoms to kindergartners (to quote Ann Coulter) led to teen pregnancy - that sex education led to teen pregnancy - that voting Democratic led to teen pregnancy - that black people were gentically predisposed to have sex at a young age and that all of this proved that Obama should not be president. And the MSM would probably go along with you.  They’d keep up the pressure until Obama dropped out leaving Edwards Hillary to lose the election.  This would all get played out as the either the second original sin OR 9/11 Part 2.

But when, as quite often happens, you’re unable to live up to the standards dictated by Sharia Law the Old Testament, welllll - everyone’s a sinner and can attain redemption under the blood-dripping body of Christ.  Bristol Palin strayed, you say, and that’s not a good thing BUT it is not up to us to judge.  It’s up to God.  And for the left-wing commie press to swoop in like vultures with their cries of “hypocrisy” shows not only that they don’t understand Jesus but  how hypocritical the press is.

THAT’S the argument that kills me - pointing out hypocrisy is hypocritical.  Janet Folger is a master of this kind of bullshit.  If you haven’t read her wonderful piece of fiction, The Criminalization of Christianity: Read This Book Before It Becomes Illegal, then you’re truly missing out.  It’s effectively a playbook for how to respond in these kinds of situations.  (For the full effect, get the audiobook version to hear Folger’s decidedly un-Christian sarcasm, derision and dismissal as she reads.)

Hopefully the MSM can keep the ConChrists on the turf the MSM defines rather than allowing them to move the debate to a completley different field.  The question to hammer away on (I was going to say “bang away” but…well, you know) is this -”How can you give the VP access to the bully pulpit when her own child turned her back on her authority?”  Put in a way that ConChrists can understand - “If Palin’s daughter ain’t gonna listen to her, how do we know that Putin fella will?”

We did some last minute school supply shopping for tomorrow and given that my oldest prefers improv to scripts, she declined to bring her list of things she needed to get at Staples.  Staples, though, is quite prepared for this eventuality and provides a number of different lists broken out by grade - pre-K, Elemenatary, Middle School, High School, College, etc.  While it’s a decent list, certain items call themselves into question.  To wit -

- Label Maker:  Chances are good that if your household doesn’t have one of these already, then you’re not not into labels to begin with because you are hippies.

- Blank CD-R/DVDs:  “Hey, Billy - got a blank DVD you can loan me?  My stupid dad didn’t think it was ‘needed’ and now I can’t save all the porn I downloaded at the computer lab.”

- USB Flash Drive:  See above.  “Of course,” my daughter told me, “most people just email it to themselves.

- Battery Operated Pencil Sharpener:  The cornerstoner of every student backpack in America!

- Favorite Pens:  Is this a brand name?  If not, how do you buy a “favorite pen”?  Don’t you need to write with them first and see which of them gets you a 97 on that test you didn’t study for last night?

- Reinforcements:  This, obviously, shows up due to a computer glitch that replaced certain key items on the george bush “war supplies” list with the “school supplies” list.  This accounts for the massive number of book socks that have been shipped to Iraq and Afghanistan.

And, my favorite - Antibacterial Hand Soap.  What with all the budget cuts and the children getting left behind most schools have fired their janitors leaving the school filthy and the soap dispensers bereft of soap of any kind whatsoever.

I’m glad we had that list.  I just KNOW it’s gonna be an A++ year!

• bush speaking tonight via satelliite…but they haven’t decided when - maybe he’ll speak after blue’s clues #
• spinning palin - anti-abortion whacko, rob schenk say, effectively - LEEEEAVE BRISTOOOOOLLLLL ALOOOOOOOOONE! http://snurl.com/3m7ht #
• @acarvin hi peter! give andy lots and lots and lots of money!! #
• @ChihuahuaMom re:bristol no offense but her MOTHER put her in the spotlight when she accepted the VP position- it’s not like she didn’t know #
• @ChihuahuaMom i’d disagree - momma palin put her own interests in front of her family - that’s not how “family values” work-can’t blame msm #
• @ChihuahuaMom i know what you’re saying but you can’t expect the wolves not to attack out of courtesy - it’s what they do #
• @ChihuahuaMom i feel sorry for her, too, honestly - it’s too bad her mom is a dick #
• is there a “google chrome” twit-user who’ll be twitting the beta release today? #
• bbn just got a message that “biden” is just a code name for “bin laden”! LOVE IT!! #
• @sol weird - the chrome url just kicks me back to the google home page #
• @FakeSarahPalin is it true that you played the mom in fargo? #
• oh @amandachapel, what would i ever do without access to your spite and derision? #
• @BuzzFeed:The 18-year-old father of Bristol Palin’s unborn baby likes hockey, banging 17yr olds #
• @amandachapel mmmmmaybe not as far as THAT but… #
• @NewsHour “Ron Paul convention at the Target Center” - i’m really trying to wrap my head around the multiple layers of that statement #
• @TSDivaDani awww,,,congrats!! #
• http://snurl.com/3m95o have all the “red flags” about palin have been made public. “I think so,” he responded “Yeah, I think so. Correct.” ” #
• still no google chrome download :’-( #
• @waynesutton microbloggin for tips? that’s a *great* tip! *laffin* #
• obama supporters might wanna flood this poll - http://snurl.com/3m999 #
• @Knownhuman “Your client does not have permission to get URL /p/chrome/ from this server. ” - those code-teases #
• roy zimmerman - http://snurl.com/3m9cs - “how can we lose?” “no, really, i’m asking - HOW?” #
• biden at “century villiage adult condo community” in deerfield beach, FL - dunno why this strikes me as hysterical #
• obama/biden “care about the issues that [holocaust] survivors care about” #
• biden to senior citizens - “can you hear back there?” #
• biden going on about how many jews he knows #
• biden - “i took my kids directly to auschwitz” #
• wow - went to hide yahoo toolbar in ie 8b2 and it asked me if i wanted to disable it - why - yes, i do! #
• “alaska is a refuge state in the last days”, sez palin’s pastor - http://snurl.com/3mbqg #
• @adamjschmidt dude - IE8b2 will hunt down nazis - what more do you want?! it’s just easier than going into tools|options|blahblah #
• i keep thinking “sarah palin tall” which is such an arcane reference it’s not even worth writing down…oops #
• @baratunde dude, he just misses the good ol’ days of the keating five - it’s senility creeping in - criminal senility #
• all the youtube feature videos for g-chrome are “no longer availabel” #
• @TSDivaDani i’ve got a feeling that it’s a transition towards a web os desktop - i’ll bet those tabs become resizable sometime #
• @stevegarfield “let’s start with a BRISK round of questions - a lightning round, if you will” quaint, quaint alaska politics! #
• Woohoo! 3hrs @ the natick mall w/spawn that don’t want me around when i could be watching the rnc #
• Natick mall: hispanic worker picked up outside nordstroms #
• Natick mall:derisive girl tween 1: mom’s on her *honeymoon*…in*mexico*
  Girl 2: that’s SO LAME #

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Yes, I am special, but sadly this offer was for everyone and not just for me.  Stupid Canadian fraudsters.

With the advent of yet another semester on WMFO comes the promise of new projects.  Hopefully, Billy Bob Neck’s Hour of Bein’ Good with be back (and you could certainly send an email to both gm@wmfo.org and pd@wmfo.org to insure that it will be).  Since MFO doles out slots in two hour bundles, this semseter I want to get back into doing radio sketch comedy again.

I’ve always loved radio comedy.  Growing up, I heard the rumors about how a long, long time ago there was no TV and people listen to the “radio” for entertainment rather than shitty music, right wing rhetoric and fund drives.  It’s all bullshit, of course.  I don’t know about the rest of the world, but America has ALWAYS had TV.  However, in the early part of the 20th century, certain performance artists decided to use radio as what they refered to as an “antidote” to TV.  The funny thing is that they achieved a certain measure of success.  This is why many people think their grandparents and great-grandparents are lame - they actually listened to the radio rather than watched TV.

In the 70’s, radio sketch comedy had a breif revival.  One of the greatest of these shows was The National Lampoon Radio Hour.  It featured a bunch of newcomers like John Belushi, Bill Murray, Christopher Guest, Tony Hendra, Gilda Radner and a couple of others.

In 2003-4, I put together a few shows of sketch comedy with Derek Gerry, Erin Judge, myq kaplan, Lanie Schulbaum, Tim Fenn, Dot Dwyer and…I know I’m missing someone but I can’t remember right now.  With luck, a lot of work and the help of some of the fine and talented folks at Improv Boston we’ll be putting together even more and mo’ better radio sketch comedy this fall.

So - below you’ll find a selection from the previous shows as a treat for the casual reader, and a demo reel for those at Improv Boston.

I wasn’t the only writer, but I wrote these.

Emmanuel Goldstein School of Leadership
How to be a “Leader”

Mamet And Child
David Mamet reads a fairy tale to his new girlfriend’s kid

Noel Bush Illegal Drug Hotline
She’ll help get rid of your drugs

Gift of the Magi
A reworking of a classic Christmas tale

The Help the Heathen Foundation
Help the Iraqis find Jesus

Jesus’ Loan Denied
A Letter from the bankwith helpful suggestions

Christmas Tragedy
CNN crushes the indomitable will of a survivor

Lottery Lesson
A sound economic policy

Larry King - White Girl In Trouble
Please help this family cope with their grief

BONUS - The Aruban Connection
Ok - I didn’t write this.  Someone who really, really missed Natalie Holloway did.  But I wish I wrote as good as they done.

Canadians hate Michael Phelps. Normally, Canadians are a peace-loving people, slow to anger and well aware that they are the perpetual bridesmaid and barring the wholesale physical and economic destruction of at least six to eight other countries, always will be. It must be getting a little old for them, though, since with this Olympics they’ve become like Brad Pitt in True Romance – smoking dope on the couch and pleasantly giving directions to the mob and, after they leave, muttering, “don’t fucking condescend to ME, man…I’ll kill you.”

We have no TV up here. My in-laws have no TV, either. Thus, we’ve followed the Olympics in the papers – The New York Times and either The Globe and Mail or Toronto Sun. Canadian papers come across as zippier and almost ironically spunkier than American papers or at least the New York Times (which I guess isn’t hard to do). Not the least difference is they don’t shy away from profanity. If Dick Cheney let’s loose with another, “go fuck yourself”, Canadian paper will quote him as saying “go fuck yourself” as opposed to “go f**k yourself” or worse “the vice president was heard uttering a profanity concerned with the act of self-copulation.”

Up until a few days ago, Canada kept coming up with maple-flavored donut-holes instead of medals. To quote one radio report, “…and the current medal count is China with 39, America with 38 and Canada…still waiting.” The announcer sounded so woebegone that I wanted to pull over and giving Canada a hug and a pep talk. Perhaps that’s why they’ve conducted a campaign to squash Phelps much the same way the Ministry of Magic tried to make Harry Potter out to be a crazy, fame-seeking egotist.

Every day the papers come up with some new reason to hate Phelps. One day it was because he tried to live a normal life. “Michael Phelps is an impostor”, the article started out, going on to say he kept trying to play the “I’m just an ordinary guy” card despite shattering records left and right. I guess he should have entered the pool in a fur coat, pimp hat and 74 gold chains dangling over his freshly waxed chest. Another article described him as “the fish that walks on two legs” which, in the context of the article was not a compliment. Others petulantly bemoaned the American dominance at the pool.

My favorite, though, was an op/ed article in the Sun which stopped just shy of accusing the US Swim program of cheating. The author snarkily went back to the original training manuals of the original Olympic games and, horrors, found no mention of computer simulations or experimental swim suit designs. HOLY SHIT! That’s…um…earth shattering. I’m pretty sure that there were no mentions of hot, sweaty volleyball chicks in skimpy bathing suits causing adolescent boys (and, perhaps their dads) to spend far too much time in the bathroom after the match ended.

Now that Canada got some medals (Women’s wrestling! Equestrian! Rowing!) perhaps they’ll back off a bit. Or maybe they’ll hire Tonya Harding to kneecap Michael Phelps.

With John Edwards brand new scandal (or at least an old one confirmed) that brings the the score to Hubris:2,243,048 - Family Values: 6

Ohhh, you silly, silly politicians that just can’t keep it in your pants.  The next thing you know, Hillary will have some fresh young intern accussing her of getting her pregnant.

Sorry.  It’s a cheap joke but they can absorb it since they’ve managed to turn the  DNC into their own personal sit-com.  Hillary’s speaking.  Bill’s speaking.  Wonder what pleasant means of extortion they’ll use to get Chelsea up there?  And what about Socks?  Oh.  Right.  They gave that prop away once they left the White House.

Still, good for me for remembering this now even more amusing article from 9/07 in the Huffington Post about an odd, odd mystery involving the removal of some Edwards campaign videos shot by a certain Rielle Hunter.  Can sex tapes be far behind?  (Jesus, I hope I’m kidding!)