April 2, 2004 by s.z.

"Even crackpot tinpot dictators fly in to the Mayo Clinic when they get a case of the wobblies" It's Friday (for a few more minutes), the day when we peek into the life of America's Worst Mother™ (a brand-name of TboggAmeriCo) and her four little treasures: Victrola, Asophidita, Crinoline, and Albertinacan. This week Tbogg has given us one of his best efforts; I think my favorite part was the visit to Meghan's alternative to Disneyland: Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Family Values Land.  So, if you haven't already, go right now and read Happy, funny storytime with Crazy Stick-Up-Her-Butt Lady. But since Tom only had room for the really funny stuff in his report. part of Meghan's story couldn't be told.  Until now.  So, sit back and let me recount The Rest of the Story.  I SAID, sit back.  Don't make me hurt you.   Okay, I guess that's far enough back.  Now, the tale of The Gurdonettes Go to Hospital and Strike a Blow Against Mickey Mouse: For some unspecified reason, instead of taking the kids to school today, Meghan takes them to a major Washington hospital.  Just what necessitates this visit?  Cooties?  Failure to thrive?  Substance abuse problems? Upon the advice of her counsel, Meghan isn't saying.  However, she is complaining about how the receptionist isn't properly solicitous of Meghan's brood, asking about insurance instead of inquiring as to how the young Gurdonettes are feeling.  For all the receptionist knows, the kids are dying from gun shot wounds to the chests, and need appendectomies STAT!  Of course, if that were the case, a normal person would have taken them to the ER instead of scheduling a routine doctor's appointment, but the receptionist doesn't know that she's not dealing with a normal person here.  So, Meghan hates her, for being more concerned about filthy lucre than these precious, snotty-nosed, foul-mouthed, gifts from God. I hand over the forms. She turns away to process our paperwork. She has not even glanced at the children. And what a treat she's missing, since the adorable cherubs are looking especially winsome today, despite the scabies.  But the receptionist is also failing to notice that Albertinacan has demolished the entire waiting room with a toy wagon -- so, there is an upside to her inattention to children.   (We're pretty sure that Albertinacan is there to get help for his crystal meth problem.) But the receptionist's insistence on doing her job causes Meghan to hearken back to  a time when things weren't like this, a time when a healthcare provider's first concern wasn't payment, but, you know, heathcare.  Of course, back them Meghan lived in England and was popping out children under the country's socialized medicine plan -- but life under communist rule did have some good aspects. But at least no one stands, arms crossed, demanding that you fill out a form before deigning to notice how white your knuckles have gone. And Meghan's have gotten pretty white, as she's just itching to punch out the receptionist for daring to ask how Meghan was going to be paying for her children's medical care.  Hell, the hospital should be paying MEGHAN for the privilege of meeting the famous Swamp Fever children.  At least Meghan she can eke a column out of this.  However, since the NRO might not like the "America needs universal health care" angle, Meghan orders the kids to do something cute, or face the consequences. The children tremble for a moment, then snap into action.   Little Crinoline tells the nurse that her name is "two-and-a-half."  Yeah, that's the stuff -- work that money maker!  And  Albertinacan cracks up the whole hospital with a fart joke.  The kids will eat tonight! Then the nurse leaves the family alone in an examination room without toys or drugs,  and now the pressure is on. These are desperate moments, as all mothers know. You do not know how long you will be waiting. You know it is your duty to keep everyone quiet and cheerful. You strenuously do not want a scene of juvenile debauchery when the door eventually opens. Because the state said that if there was another one of those, the kids were going into foster care.  And it was just such a scene that caused the kids' last pediatrician to inform Meghan that another doctor might be better suited to her children's specialized needs -- and happily enough, he'd heard that St. Elizabeth's was taking new patients.  (Sure, Meghan tells everybody that the switch in doctors is due to insurance issues, but she fails to mention that it was the doctor's insurance company that insisted on the parting of the ways.) Anyway, Meghan is frantic, trying to think of a way to keep in the kids in line until the new doc shows up.  Usually she makes condom animals for the children ("a good ten minutes of riotous fun"), but this time the alert medical staff has locked the supply cabinet.  Then the children spot one of those things you humans call a "book."  They all bat their long eyelashes, curl up to Mummy, and tell her that it would delight them all ever so much if she would condescend to read the tome to them.  Well, all except Albertinacan.  He's still on a manic high, and is using the wheeled stool as a bumper car.  Even though he's making dents in the walls and cracks in the EKG machine in the corner, it does Meghan's heart good to see her little man amusing himself so charmingly. So, she leaves him to his fun, and accedes to her daughters' request for a story.  But there's a problem.  The book the girls have found isn't a volume of Proust or William F. Buckley, the children's usual fare.  No, it's a DISNEY book.  And Meghan tries to keep such depravity away from the tikes, in an effort to keep them unsullied by modernity.  SpongeBob, Spiderman, Pikacu, Mel Gibson's Jesus, Karl Rove's George Bush -- Meghan tries to protect her kids from all of them. I have to say, I regard it as a personal triumph that most of our children don't know most of these characters.  One of my friends pokes fun at us for living in "1900 House," but my feeling is that the longer the children's minds are uncluttered by pre-fabricated images, the better. And the more strange and weird the children are, the more friends they'll have.  And Meghan wants what's best for them, no matter how stupid it is. So, Meghan transforms the tale of Donald Duck Vs. The Gingerbread Man into one about Duckman ("Private Dick, Family Man"). Meghan really gets into it, doing all the voices and thinking up hilarious names for all of the characters (Duck Woman, Funny Looking Dog, Scrooge McDerbyshire, Jonah Mouse, Rich Lowry Rat, Kathryn Jean Lopez Shrew, etc.)  She loses the kids, but it amuses Meghan no end. "Stop laughing," Phoebe says irritably. " — And I can run away from you, I can, I can!" But at this point, Meghan's jeu d'esprit is interrupted: The door opens suddenly, and a white-coated person appears. Not again!  Meghan is NOT going back to Happy Acres!  But before Meghan can explain that it's perfectly normal for a grown woman to laugh herself silly by making up names for the characters in a children's picture book, the woman (who turns out to be the pediatrician), orders Paris off the wheeled stool. This infuriates Meghan.  Now DARE somebody fail to be captivated by one of her children? Molly glances at me with apprehension. There have been incidents when Mummy has not responded politely to such peremptory treatment of her family. Yes, poor Victrola has seen Meghan knife a man for less.  There was that time just last week when Meghan punched out an elderly woman for not laughing when Albertican adorably kicked away her crutches.  And Victrola is still traumatized after seeing Meghan use an Uzi on that neighbor who yelled at Asophidita for killing his cat. But because Victrola is expecting violence, Meghan decides to throw her off guard by seducing the doctor instead.  You know, so Meghan doesn't have to pay for the visit when the receptionist figures out that Meghan made up the insurance info (no, Blue Cross, Blue Nun isn't a real company).  Meghan starts by telling the doctor what good things she's heard about her, then unbuttons a few buttons on her blouse and sticks her tongue in the doc's ear. It works. The hard face softens, the manner eases, and in no time she is calling the children by their names and exhibiting interest in their aches and pains. And if a lesbian encounter was all it took, Meghan is more than willing to make the sacrifice.  For the sake of her children. However, the children are strangely upset by seeing their mother going at it with their doctor, and manifest their trauma by acting out some weird, scatological psychodrama.  "You like to eat peanuts," Violet suddenly tells Molly. "You like to eat wee-nuts," Paris tells Violet. "Well, you like to eat poo-nuts," Violet repostes. "Ew — " "Glue-nuts," Phoebe chimes in, "Goo-nuts, woo-nuts! "You like to eat spider nuts, Paris," Violet says archly. He turns on her fiercely. "Don't say 'spider' around Mummy," he hisses. Albertinacan, mummy's special protector, threatens to poke a lollipop stick into his little sister's brain if she doesn't shut up about spiders; and he'd do it too, such is his oedipal rage.   But happily for everyone, just then the nice nurse comes in and administers sedatives for everyone, and then has security remove them from the building.  But we are never told exactly why Albertinacan won't allow his siblings to speak of spiders in Mummy's presence.  I'm guessing it's because he knows that the subject is a sore one, ever since she went to jail for eating Daddy.  ("Black Widow: she mates, then she kills -- and then she enjoys a nice dinner.") Anyway, in our O. Henry twist, the security guard gives the kids Mickey Mouse Band-Aid to put on the boo-boos they got when he threw them down the stairs. Some days it's harder than usual to be a kiddie counterculturalist. Yes, but it will all be worth it when the kids are in their forties, and still living at home, innocent of the world and its evils.   11:48:54 PM

Women Just Don't Deserve To Be Mothers You've all heard of the sad case of Deanna Laney, the Texas women who stoned her three children (killing two of them) because she thought God told her to do it.  Five mental health experts (including one hired by the prosecution) have said she meets the standard of legal insanity, as her psychotic delusions rendered her incapable of knowing right from wrong.  So, who's to blame for her acts? A liberal culture which allows abortion, says Jan Ireland, an old friend of World O'Crap.  Well, abortion and a woman who, while perhaps legally insane, actually killed her kids (and then called 911 to report what she'd done) because she was a selfish bitch who was sick of being with the kids 24/7, and thought that life in jail would be a pleasant alternative. And despite the fact that Deanna led a very religious, very isolated life, and so had little contact with mainstream American culture, it was that culture's fault that she decided to kill her sons.   And the fact that we don't classify the slayings of children by their mothers as "hate crimes" just proves ... something.  Anyway, Jan's piece is the wackiest (and most mean spirited, and most misogynistic) I've read today, so allow me to share some of it with you: Dee says God told her to do it. So in a deeply religious family, why hide that? God's will is followed in deeply religious families. If Dee felt she was doing what God wanted her to do, there should have been joy. "Woo hoo! God wants me to kill the kids!" She committed the acts furtively because Dee knew that she was not obeying God. She presumably committed the acts furtively because she knew that her husband would try to stop her if he found out what she was intending to do, because he didn't have the "faith" that she did. She was acting out of deep narcissistic anger at being trapped. Though it is quite likely that Dee felt love for her children, she felt much more love for herself. She likely was ill equipped to spend her days alone, isolated, with three boys to care for and school. And that's why we should fry her -- for being ill-equipped (by virtue of being mentally ill) for the task of being home alone with three kids all day, every day.  However, if abortion weren't legal, Deanna would have valued her children more, and none of this would have happened.  Hey, just listen to Jan. No doubt Dee was influenced by a culture that does not value children. After all, we abort about a million a year. We allow a woman to prosecute a man for hitting her stomach during pregnancy, but that same woman can kill that same baby the next week if she gets tired of it. We celebrate Laci and Conner's law to officially treat a fetus as a human, but say that another fetus can be plucked out when the woman fears a birth moment hangnail. "Birth moment hangnail" -- is an apparent reference to Melissa Ann Rowland, another mentally ill woman,  and the infamous "scar" story.  However, Rowland is in jail because she DIDN'T have her fetus "plucked out" via c-section.  (And. per her husband, her decision not to have a c-section when her doctors recommended it wasn't motivated by fear of scarring, but because she didn't want anyone to find out she'd been smoking crack while 8 months pregnant.)  In any case, the point of the "hangnail" reference seems to be that women in our culture are too selfish and self-centered to be allowed to bear or have children. If all these things can be done to babies in America, but are not acceptable in a very religious wife and mother's world, imagine the anger a "religious" woman can build up toward children she does not really want. Jan isn't saying that if Deanna's religious beliefs hadn't prevented her from aborting the children she didn't want (although all the evidence indicates that Deanna loved and wanted her children), then this whole tragedy could have been prevented.  And she isn't saying that Deanna's religious beliefs, which helped to isolate her and put the entire burden of the childrens' care on her, aren't partially to blame either.  No, Jan is saying that since abortions were legal, and yet Deanna didn't believe they were morally acceptable, then of course she would get frustrated and murder her kids when, after years of being a faithful, God-fearing mother, she suddenly realized that raising kids just wasn't as fun as she'd thought it would be. And that is the gist of Dee's hate for her children. That they were there. Parenting takes away a measure of freedom. Parents at some point have to put either their own or their children's needs first. Nature's way is that parents choose the welfare of the children. They give up their own youth, to move toward their own death. It is part of the maturation process of humans, and nature's way of marching humans through the years. Dee didn't like her fate, so she killed her children to get out of it. Dee is reportedly on super suicide watch. She cries wrenchingly as the details of her actions are reported in court. Just as Andrea Yates did, a hauntingly similar case. But as time wore on in court, Andrea Yates began to look lighter and younger and happier. As no doubt Dee will. Yes, after the anti-psychotic medication and antidepressants started taking effect, Andrea looked better; Dee probably will too.  And actually, Deanna was a lot calmer when she first confessed to the crimes, because back then she thought that she had done God's will, and He would resurrect the kids.  She has enough drugs in her system now to know that's not gonna happen. And gee, if life in prison is such a happy respite for women like Andrea and Deanna, what does that say about life as an isolated, religious, home-schooling Mom?  Maybe we should offer them the "out" of prison, BEFORE they kill the kids (whom we could then send to Michelle Malkin raise).  Then everybody would be happy. 4:52:45 AM

Now the Damned Gays are Stealing Derb's "Gay" THEY CAN HAVE MY VOCABULARY... [John Derbyshire] ...when they prise it from my cold dead fingers. In yesterday's column I indulged myself in a grumble about the loss of the word "gay" to the homosexualists. Language conservatives have been grumbling about this for 40 years, of course; but I don't see why there should be any statute of limitations on linguistic larceny of this kind. [snip] The problem is, of course, that you can't read this poem [Yeat's "Lapis Lazuli"} as it was meant to be read, because that key word has been trashed. This might seem a small thing to get worked up about, in a world where horrors like the Fallujah killings are happening every day, but I am worked up about it. (And the poem, by the way, addresses exactly the propriety of getting worked up over art in a world of war--or, in Yeats's case, incipient war.) I for one will not surrender. I am going to use "gay" in its proper, Yeatsian sense every chance I get. Posted at 01:45 PM Derb, you're not alone -- Bernard Chapin of Men'sNewsDaily was whining about this very thing just a couple of days ago. Chapin starts with an anecdote told by a "politically incorrect" comedian who was informed by a homosexual man that said homosexual man found offensive the comedian's use of the world "gay" as a synonym for "lame" or "goofy." (The punch line is, "Man, that would be really gay of you to use Jewish like that.") I went to various different dictionary websites and was unable to find gay defined as “outlandish, goofy, bizarre” or “peculiar” on any of them.  Therefore, I’ll refer to my and the comedian’s usage as being the seventh, shadow definition of a term no dictionary has the courage to define (seventh due to no source offering more than six).  The seventh interpretation of gay is the way in which many people from my generation once principally used the term.  Today, sadly, more and more of us are gradually being intimidated into not using the word under any circumstances whatsoever. But I personally object to this capitulation.  I am a conservative and we conservatives must conserve what is essential and valuable to society, and, in my opinion, the shadow usage of gay is something we should not willingly abandon.  [snip] Why should we have to retire a phrase like “that’s so gay” from our conversation?  Just because gay activists will hate us?  [Although, interestingly enough, it is never we who hate them.]  Well, look, I understand that no one wants to be a bully and I admit that a large part of gay culture would fall under my rubric of, “man, that is so gay” but I don’t see how heterosexuals are going to make those people happy at any level. [snip] Honestly though, their antagonism towards the term “gay” is mostly misplaced.  In my case, most of the time I use it I’m not referring to homosexuals at all, but, it does remain quite descriptive of their behaviors.  You know, when Chapin grows up and becomes a cranky misanthrope like Derb, I bet he'll get HIS photo featured on a "Pop Cuture is filth" T-shirt too.  Anyway, maybe messieurs Derbyshire and Chapin can have a boys' night out where they read Yeats' poetry together, and discuss whether the eyes of the Chinamen in the carving were "merry" or "whack."  But one thing they would agree upon is that being a conservative means that you always insist on using the "traditional" meaning of a word, if you can thereby send the message to some group of which you don't approve that "they're not the boss of you."  See, the mention of the Chinese artwork reminds me of an acquaintance who huffily informed us a year or two ago that he had just learned that the word "oriental" had been deemed un-P.C., and how "they" were stealing all these perfectly good words from the vocabulary, while "they" still got to use them among themselves (he used the NAACP and United Negro College Fund as examples of this).  Finally, a Japanese-American woman politely told him that most Asians preferred the word "Asian" as an ethnic descriptor, and asked him why he couldn't the word they preferred.  The answer: because they're "not the boss" of him.  After that, he used "Oriental" on every possible occasion, claiming this was an act of defiance against the "P.C. thought police," and an attack on those who would co-opt our traditional vocabulary.  However, we all just thought he was an obnoxious jerk who was trying to get attention.  I imagine Derb and Chapin also get that reaction a lot. 1:42:05 AM