July 8, 2004 by s.z.

News of the Blog World! 1.  It's Tom of TBogg's birthday.  Happy birthday, Tom! 2.   The Dark Window has attracted a large influx readers from Vox Day's blog, all intent on saving the souls of  liberal sinners who make fun of Kirk Cameron.   Hey, guys, when I said that God was damning Pete to an eternity of torment because He loves him, I was just talking about Pete -- don't try to extrapolate my theology from that! 3.  Here's your chance to vote in the last (or ultimate) Rittenhouse Review "Law and Order" poll: "Who is/was the better D.A., Michael Moriarty or Sam Waterston?"  Vote early, and vote often!  4.  Seb at Sadly, No!, who has achieved widespread acclaim for his reporting of international stories about American abuse of children in Iraqi prisons, also has all the news on the internet's hottest young conservative bloggers, plus Kerry "I do too know what antithesis means!" Marsala. Oh, and it was Sadly, No's birthday last week.  We gave it a Precious Moments figurine. 5.  And it was Sully Watch's two-year anniversary last week.  So, we're adding it to the blogroll, since it looks like it has staying power!  (Actually, we added it a long time ago, but we did something wrong with the code so it never showed up.) So, in conclusion, let me just repeat the words of the Channel 13 anchorbimbo during the promo for tonight's newscast: "Woman's house catches fire tonight at ten!"  10:09:43 PM

Harriet Beecher Stowe's Family Circus Today's Cartoon  (See it here: Mommy, whose facial deterioration continues unabated, is holding an old-style photo album, looking at a picture of a guy in a cap and gown, and of with him and some blurry shapes which might be other people. Jeffy asks, "Why did Uncle Tom graduate in a black nightgown?" Analysis: They stopped making this kind of photo album (the ones with the black paper pages and the raised holders into which you have to slide the corners of the photos) a long time ago (at least, I haven't seen any of them for a long time).  Therefore, this is a photo of Uncle from a long, long time ago.  It's quite unlikely he's still alive.  Further evidence of this theory is that Jeffy asks why Uncle Tom "graduated" in a "black nightgown."  The "graduation" could refer to the passage from life to death, and the "black nightgown" could be something Uncle Bill wears for his long sleep.  Yet Jeffy, who can't be more than four, seems to know the very late Uncle Tom.  So, maybe those ghostly presences in the first photo really ARE ghosts -- as is Uncle Tom.  As is Jeffy. This points to this cartoon being a variation the movie "The Others" (don't read any more if you haven't seen the movie and don't want the not-all-that-surprising ending revealed). Obviously Mommy, who snapped under the strain of caring for her four dimwitted offspring, smothered them all and then killed herself.  Daddy died in the war, and can only find his way home to visit his family occasionally; he never sticks around long, because time with his family soon reminds him why he volunteered for war in the first place.  This explains why the kids never age, why they often seem unfamiliar with modern-day life, and why dead Grandpa and the phantom Ida Know are such frequent visitors to the Circus home.  Yup, they're all dead, and they just don't know it (well, Ida and Grandpa do, but the rest are in a state of furious denial).  Just like how the Republicans keep insisting that Bush's reelection isn't dead, it's just resting, or pinin' for the fjords, and will snap back as soon as there's another terrorist attack.  You know, because Bush keeps us safe from terrorists, except for the ones that attack us and reinforce just how much we need him to protect us. Prediction: Later this year it will be revealed that Bil Keane smothered Jeff and then killed himself back in 1998.  Since then, the strip has been written and drawn by a medium who claims to channel both men "from beyond the grave." Or will it?  Probably not.  Almost certainly not.  I don't know why I said it.  So, I'm glad to have some comments from some of our most gifted predictors who also happen to waste their nights on the web (truly, some excellent work today).  Here are those comments, pretty much as posted (you can read the  unexpurgated versions in the comments section for yesterday's FC cartoon -- if you DARE!): You know, I really think that Keane might be black. I know, it's not a popular conception, but look at the work he's done recently: black power salute, "Uncle Tom" references. They are looking through the family album! This is someone in their family circle who they're calling an Uncle Tom. And then, the little dude (I get their names mixed up,) is repeating something that he must have heard from the adults: Uncle Tom wears a nightgown. How often have you walked into a room in your family's house and heard whispered remarks like these? Okay, maybe you need to meet my family. And what did he "graduate" from? Why are the other people in the top photo fuzzy and out of focus? Are they in the CIA or something? I think there is a lot more going on in this family than we've been led to believe. Look at Mommy's eye. The kid is on to something, and if he knows what's good for him, he'd better shut up. Prediction: Keane is going to "come out" in some way. I'm not sure what way, but there's going to be a big surprise.  •Ekstase • Tomorrow's cartoon is, as Ekstase suggested, a disturbing one. Analysis: Little Turkee looks up at S.Z. and asks about a certain "Uncle Tom" and his graduation from high school. Turkee, as is so often the case, represents the Right Wing pundits who equate sending their kids to public schools with selling out. The poor little guy seems to associate learning things like biology and chemistry with mourning (the black gown) and is advocating a mass exodus to homeschooling. S.Z., on the other hand, stares dreamily at nothing, her thoughts distracted by Turkee's mention of a nightgown. In other words, she can't wait to rip her own nightgown off later so she can start blogging again. Prediction: The Southern Baptist Convention will finally officially encourage all its families to remove their children from "government schools." This will lead to mountains of funny material and a fertile new period of blogging for S.Z. during which every word of World o'Crap will be covered daily by CNN, Der Spiegel, and the Drudge Report. Developing... • Pete M. •   "Why did Uncle Tom graduate in a black nightgown?" "Uncle Tom/Clarence Thomas only graduated at all because he personally benefitted from Affirmative Action." "Does Uncle Tom still wear a black nightgown?" "Yes, he does. He wears it to his job on the Supreme Court where he consistently rules against Affirmative Action." • Alison •   So, some excellent ideas.  But has the definitive explanation been posted?  Only Bil Keane knows.  Hey, one of you could be Bil Kean!  I bet it's Preznit or AntiChrist Coulter!  In any case, your ideas welcomed. 5:47:30 AM

Ann Coulter: The Rich Are Different Than You and Me.  Well, Different Than You. Ann Coulter uses this week's column to attack John Edwards for being John Kerry's VP pick, because Edwards is rich, and because Edwards is a lawyer (and rich lawyers are NOT real Americans).  How will Ann work in her Bill Clinton and Ted Kennedy slams this week?  Let's watch: I guess with John Kerry's choice of John Edwards as his running mate, he really does want to stand up for all Americans, from those worth only $60 million to those worth in excess of $800 million. In one of the many stratagems Democrats have developed to avoid telling people what they believe, all Edwards wants to talk about is his cracker-barrel humble origins story. We're supposed to swoon over his "life story," as the flacks say, which apparently consists of the amazing fact that ... his father was a millworker! That's right up there with "Clinton's stepdad was a drunk" and "Ted Kennedy's dad was a womanizing bootlegger" on my inspirational life-stories meter.  So, Ann brought in Clinton and Kennedy because, like them, Edwards had a father.  In fact, I'm immediately renouncing my university degrees and going to work for the post office just to give my future children a shot at having a "life story," should they decide to run for president someday. Yeah, right -- like Ann could cut it at the post office!  Unless Richard Mellon Scaife bought the postal system and ran it as a conservative dirty-tricks enterprise set up to "get" the Clintons -- then Ann could maybe get a job writing poision pen letters.   And yeah, like there are children in Ann's future.  At nearly 44, it's possible that she could still conceive, I suppose ... if it wasn't for that horomonal problem.  But you know that if she ever did give birth, she'd immediately eat her young -- so she'll never have to worry about having children who will grow up full of shame and self-loathing because of their mothers loathsome profession: conservative "author" and TV personality. What is so amazing about Edwards' father being a millworker? That's at least an honorable occupation -- as opposed to being a trial lawyer. Ann, of course, was a corporate lawyer, counsel to the Senate republicans, and Paula Jones "elf."  You know, a GOOD lawyer.  However, for her crimes against humanity, the ABA apparently punished her by doing a brain wipe to remove everything she learned at law school, because in her writings she seems to posses all the legal knowledge of bag of hammers. True, Edwards made more money than his father did. I assume strippers make more money than their alcoholic fathers who abandoned them did, too. This isn't a story of progress; it's a story of devolution. So, Ann is claiming that alcoholic fathers who abandon their children are categorically poor?  And that it's devolution to go from an alcoholic deadbeat parent to a stripper?  It's a good thing that Ann isn't going to be having those "future children." And speaking of devolution, Ann's father was a union-busting lawyer for Phelps Dodge Corporation, the mining and manufacturing giant -- while negotiating with the unions, he presided over the largest union decertification ever..  One would think that his offspring couldn't sink much lower than that, but Ann is proof that one of them could. Here's Ann defending Dad in a NY Observer interivew:  One of those cases was the copper mines in Arizona …. I’ve worked in one of those mines, as has my brother, as summer jobs. They get very high wages, they get all their health care taken care of, and it’s an open-pit mine, so you’re working on the side of a mountain—and for the union to be going on strike at that point was just absurd, and they broke the strike and the union was voted out."  Yes, working in the copper mines is a great job, because it's on the mountainside, in the sunshine and fresh air, so it's just like a stay at resort or Swiss health spa.  (How much do you want to bet than young Ann and her brother worked as office help during their little summer adventures, and not actually doing any mining?) And speaking of Ann and her father, I've always liked this bit from a Guardian interview from last year: Maybe we should condemn Ann Coulter a little less and understand her a little more. For wouldn't a psychologist hear in this woman's delight in male praise, her disdain for her own femaleness, the cry of the young Coulter girl, craving the approval of her tough, take-no-prisoners, all-argument-all-the-time father? Isn't she like Margaret Thatcher, the daughter of a conservative, dominant man who grooms his little girl to talk and fight just like him - just like a man? I wonder what a shrink would suggest lay at the root of Ann Coulter's hard-core conservatism. "Is the shrink a patriotic American?" she replies. "He'd say I'm just fine." Sure he would, Ann.  But Ann does seem to have a fixation on strong, stern, emotionally witholding, mean-spirited, conservative men.  Is she looking for a man like Daddy?  Probably.  Here's Ann talking about her ideal man in that Observer piece: "Cheney is my ideal man. Because he’s solid. He’s funny. He’s very handsome. He was a football player. People don’t think about him as the glamour type because he’s a serious person, he wears glasses, he’s lost his hair. But he’s a very handsome man. And you cannot imagine him losing his temper, which I find extremely sexy. Men who get upset and lose their tempers and claim to be sensitive males: talk about girly boys. No, there’s a reason hurricanes are named after women and homosexual men, it’s one of our little methods of social control. We’re supposed to fly off the handle." So, you  know, if Cheney were ever to fly off the handle in the senate and tell a senator to "go f--- himself," it would mean that Cheney is gay.  Not that he is, of course.  He wears glasses -- he would NEVER lose his temper like a mere woman.  Anyway, in Ann's column she goes on to make fun of Edwards for the courtroom technique that won his client a $6.5 million award.  It really ticks off Ann, because money like that should stay in the hands of the insurance companies and corporations that deserve it, and not be given to people with injured children.  Plus, taking cases like this made Edward rich, and that's not right!  People shouldn't be allowed to become rich through use of their talents, ideas, and skills -- because that would be free-market capitalism, which is something that Ann is completely opposed to.  Thus, in conclusion, we see that John Edwards, the son of a millworker who managed to became a lawyer and then won a lot of cases is a horrible, horrible person, because unlike Ann, who went from a life of privilege in Fairfield County, Connecticut, to being supported by various conservative think-tanks, foundations, and publishers, Edwards TOOK money from the rich and gave it to the poor, instead of the other way around. 4:02:09 AM

Mike Adams Screams, "Gimme back my lesbian, midget, Asian schoolgirl porn!" This is the column too edgy for Townhall: On Thursday July 8, I will be running an article entitled “Gimme back my lesbian, midget, Asian schoolgirl porn.” This article brings to your attention the proliferation of pornography in the UNC system. The article will discuss some of the hard core pornography that has been posted on the UNC Greensboro website. It also discusses other sexually explicit material in the UNCG student newspaper. Because of the article’s highly offensive language and imagery, Jonathan Garthwaite and I have agreed not to send it to Townhall readers in tomorrow’s Opinion Alert. Instead, the article will only appear onwww.DrAdams.org. So by all means, let's go to the hard core site which Dr. Adams runs and read all about his cutting-edge porn research: After the administration declared its abhorrence of pornography, I logged on to www.uncg.edu and immediately discovered that it was a reliable source for locating all kinds of hard core pornography. With the help of the UNCG search engine, anyone could find the right kind of porn, regardless of their demographics.   Um, yeah.  Because the UNCG system is "powered by Campus Pipeline ... Campus Pipeline provides an easier and user friendly way to access information from UNCG's computer system and the Internet."  Campus Pipeline, which is used by more than a dozen schools, allows you to "search the Web for information on the Internet, using one of twelve search engines."  Those search engines include Ask Jeeves, DejaNews, Excite, Google, HotBot, Looksmart, Lycos, MetaCrawler, NBCi, Web Crawler, and Yahoo.  So, Dr. Adams has discovered that there's porn on the internet, and that you can find it by using search engines!!!  And then he spent a lot of time finding all kinds of specialized porn, um, to prove that there are really disgusting things out there for those who are looking for them.  You know, like Dr. Adams.  But he was only looking for scientific purposes, of course.  For the sake of the children. But now the party seems to be over on www.uncg.edu. This morning, when I did a search for “lesbian porn,” I was directed to a link with the following description posted below: “lesbian video clips: midgets f***ing; suspension bondage; and Asian schoolgirls.” But, when I tried to open the folder to learn more, I got a message that said the porn had “been moved or does not exist on this server.” It also said that “If the page you were trying to access is a part of the main UNCG website, contact University Relations at comments@uncg.edu.”  Damn!  One of the internet porn sites that Mike tried to access had been moved or went out of business.  And since he was using the UNCG system to find it, he got that message from the UNCG system.  Proving that UNCG is behind all the porn on the internet.   Well, that's what Dr. Adams, Ph.D., and criminology professor, seems to believe.   You know, if I had a daughter (or son) who wanted to study criminology, Dr. Mike would certainly convince me to send her (or him) to somewhere other than UNCW -- because what would her degree be worth after Dr. Mike has done his best to convince that the world that he's the smartest guy in the whole UNC university system, and then he writes columns which demonstrate that he's a complete moron? Anyone who knows me is aware that I don’t give up so easily. Not when he's on the track of porn, at least. After a series of disappointments with the UNCG search engine, I just picked up a copy of the UNCG student newspaper (The Carolinian) to get a sample of their weekly soft core porn. And what an educational experience it was! Don’t take my word for it, just read the following front page excerpt. Well, I don't want to copy that excerpt here, because unlike Dr. Adams, I try to run a respectable site, and I find Mike's extensive use of asterisks shockingly lame (he feels compelled to quote long passages about the erotic potential of anal stimulation, but sanitizes the word "ass"  to spare our delicate sensibilities).  Anyway, the Carolinian piece seems to be a racy (but not pornographic) column from a college paper Anka Radakovich-wannabe, writing about the kind of sex made popular by Wonkette.  I found the unexcerpted piece via Google. (Google, btw, is a search engine, and not affiliated with UNCG or those lesbian midget pornstars who so aroused Dr. Mike's, um, curiosity.)  Here's the citation: Neurotica: Fanny got fingered... It's high time anal stimulation came out of the cultural closet. Our asses are filled - no pun intended - with erotic potential. ... www.carolinianonline.com/main.cfm/ include/detail/storyid/688673.html - 50k      I was able to access the first page of this article for a couple of minutes when I first clicked the link, but then I got an error message, since I wasn't logged on the UNCG system.  Which brought a thought to mind: since all this web surfing for porn was done by Dr. Mike through his university-provided account, and records of the webpages Mike accessed were presumable kept by the system and stored somewhere, do you think this "column" is really just a desperate attempt by Mike to provide an excuse for why he was looking at Asian school girl porn at work? While that article was informative, I still plan to get in touch with University Relations to get them to post the really good stuff they seem to have deleted from the university website. You know, that university website called "the Internet." There’s just so much I still don’t understand. What exactly is a “seasoned butt pirate?” And just what is up with anal probing? Per what I saw of the article, "anal probing" was a joke from Men In Black.  I hope that helps, Mike. Even though I may be behind the times (pun intended) and unskilled in the use of colons (pun also intended) there is one thing I know for sure. The University of North Carolina at Greensboro is in dire need of an administrative enema.  And there's one thing I know: while Dr. Mike shouldn't be reprimanded or discriminated against because of his unpopular opinons, UNCG should fire him because he's too stupid and/or mentally unbalanced to be teaching those vulnerable young people that he ... I mean, the guy who sent him that letter, was talking about yesterday. 2:13:59 AM

Deep Thoughts, by Peggy Noonan Here's Our Lady of the Dolphins: By the way, Republicans tend not to point at the crowd in this way. They wave. I think it's because their mothers taught them pointing is rude. Someday, in 2008 or 20012, there will, however, be a Republican pointer. And we will know history has truly changed. Because that man's mother will not have taught him that pointing is rude, for she was working 18 hours a day in a law firm, and forgot. And here's Jack Handey (from the 1999 Desk Calendar): Someday I hope there is a war between the zombies and the bees, because who cares who wins?  Let them work it out. Here's Peg again: Boobs are sophisticated now. They may be sophisticated beyond their intelligence, but they know rote words used to please them are rote words used to please them. And they're not impressed. And here's Jack: They probably won't send Superman to hell, even if he deserves it, because he'd just be breaking things and bending things.  Just let him go. And yet, only one of them was being funny on purpose.  Which says a lot about our ideas of humor, and The Wall Street Journal's opinion page. 12:12:09 AM