Thursday, August 28, 2008

Change is all we'll have...and we'll need it to live.

Plagiarism Is In Vogue Once More!

Three observations as Senator B. Hussein Obama accepts the nomination of his Party:

1) Has anyone (other than me) noticed that Senators Obama and Biden have been accused of plagiarism? That they will give us "...change you can Xerox"...and leave us with change in our pockets.

2) Has anyone (other than me) watched some of the freaks and retards* that make up the delegates at the DNC? Aren't you just a little bit glad that they believe in abortion on demand?

3) Is anyone (other than me) tired of hearing the lies that all politicians tell, assuming that we, the people, are just too plain stupid to hear the truth? And, aren't you just a little bit tired of hearing how great a speaker Senator Obama is?

Or seeing him act the part of the rock star. Hell, I keep waiting for U2 to take the stage.

I am going to bed.

*With apologies to freaks and retards.


Thursday, August 21, 2008

Thank God We Live In America...



The Games Of The XXIX Olympiad
I have been watching the Olympics (off and on) since they began almost two weeks ago. Softball and baseball have been relegated to the Oh-Dark-Thirty hours, so I have had to satisfy my jones for international softball/baseball by reading the newspaper.

Women's Beach Volleyball has been a favourite of The Lifeguard (beaches and women--what's not to like). Congratulations, by the way, to Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh.

Then, there was the FUBARed baton pass in both the Men's and Women's 4x100m Relay.

Well, at least USA Track can take solace that they don't live in the former Soviet Union (where they would be sent to the Gulag); or, Iraq (where Uday or Qusay would drop them into an industrial shredder).

So, at least they have that going for them.

That all having been said, The Lifeguard does enjoy the Olympics. I grew up watching them every four years; and, I remember cheering for the American athletes. I took it personally when the United States didn't win every medal; but, I also understood (and admired) the situation facing the athletes from certain countries. Athletes whose lives changed drastically (for the worse or the better) depending upon their success on the balance beam, the court, the pool, or the track.

I remember watching the tragedy of the 1972 Munich Olympics as it happened.

I remember Bruce Jenner winning the decathlon, and the "Miracle on Ice."

I remember the US boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics...and the Soviet Union's boycott of the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.

I remember thinking that I could be on that podium, collecting my gold medal (if only I were citius, altius or fortius.) And, by gum, I would sing the Star Spangled Banner. I mean, I would belt it out ('though they might have then stripped me of my medal for my awful singing).

Anyway, back to the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, y'all.

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

The Mendacity of the Dope...

Chapter Two

On of the young missionaries approached me.  She was young, white, and expensively dressed.  I detected a faint scent of Fleur de Fleurs, and the smell of Crest toothpaste on her breath.  Were we not in public (and were she alone), I would have taken her in my arms and kissed her, deeply.

But, we were (and she wasn't).

"Are you registered to vote?"  

"Yes, ever since I was eighteen."

"Are you a believer?" she asked.

"In what?"  (It seemed to be a good time to be a little coy.)

"Our Lord and Saviour, Barack Obama."  (Actually, she said "Senator" instead of "Lord and Saviour"; but, the latter makes for a better story.)

"No."

"Because he's black?" she asked.

"No, because he is the least qualified man ever to run for the highest office in this great land of ours.  And, because he is without conviction.  He seems to change his positions with the wind.  He sat, for twenty years, and listened to a racist crackpot denigrate America, without complaint.  He has a messiah complex."  I could have gone on for hours.  The fact that he really is an African-American has nothing to do with my feelings about the Illinois senator.

"Well," she said.  "Have you read his syllabus from when he was a professor at the University of Chicago Law School?  He is brilliant."  (She said this word--"brilliant"--like she was English.)

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I have."  (I can not believe that this is happening.  I had been asked by my friend, K, if I had read his syllabus.  Whether I knew anything about Senator Obama's law school tenure.  Since (then) I had not, I went out and read everything that I could find.)

"I also read an article about how then-Professor Obama had been hired to teach to help diversify the faculty at U of C.  How he had been offered tenure though he had never (which is to say, never) published.  And, I looked at his syllabus, which I found to be nothing special.  Oh, and it had several typos."

"Well, what would you know about his syllabus?  It's not like you are a lawyer," she retorted.

"Actually...I am The Lifeguard.  And, when I was in law school, I read all of the case law on his syllabus.  Most every law student does.  I had also read many of the articles, speeches and books that he suggests in his bibliography.  I also can not understand his lack of scholarship.  Pretty much every tenured professor that I knew lamented about the need to 'publish or perish.'  I also found it interesting that in twelve years at U of C, he never really expressed any firm opinions or views."  (I could have gone on for hours.)

"Ummm," she said.

"Ummm," she said again.

"You sound like Senator Obama once he is off of the teleprompter," I told her.

"You are a Right-Wing racist," she said, walking away, frustration evident in her voice and demeanour.

And, as I watched she and her shapely friend retreat into the crowd, I remembered that when an Obama supporter calls one names, the Obama supporter has ceded the argument.