After the initial shock and wave of disgust passed, I found myself reciting a Shel Silverstein poem in my head:

“…Back to back they faced each other

Drew their swords and SHOT each other…”

This melee began with 2 women arguing over the same item. Their boyfriends, (obviously fresh from their good neighbor diplomacy course,) decided to assist with the negotiations.  The first boyfriend raised his shirt to show the other his handgun.  The other boyfriend, clearly moved by the first party’s gesture of goodwill, pulled his own handgun and pointed it in the face of the first and threatened to kill him.  Detente, however, did not ensue as the second man chased the first down the aisles of the toy store shooting at each other.

In a toystore, I could imagine children, demonstrating the various laser tag devices on the market today.  Laughing and giggling as they run through the racks of G.I Joes, transformers and Barbie Dolls as they finally faced off in the electric toy car section.  Once there, they can face each other in an epic gun battle reminiscent of Wyatt Earp and the Clanton Gang at the O.K. Corral.  Using the plastic cars as cover, they dodge from left to right as their toy guns make laser beam sounds each time they squeeze off the trigger, hoping to hear the “Scoring” sound when their foe is “hit”

This was, however, not the case.  The reports of the gunshots were real gunshots.  Nearby witnesses could see the smoking guns held tightly in the hands of these 2 thugs.  This human trash, carrying their weapons in their hands hoping to kill the other, regardless of the innocents they might have hurt.

Somewhere along the course of the initial argument between these 2 women, their 2 “men” made a choice to use lethal force.  Over a childs toy.  They were determined to kill each other at all costs.

There is a happy ending to this story:  They somehow managed to kill each other and no one else was hurt.  Dont get me wrong. Somewhere, there are some children who probably lost their fathers yesterday.  That makes me feel sad.  Hopefully they learn the pain of violence and use it to make the world a better place.

Who the fuck carries a gun to a toy store? Not one person, but TWO?  What are the odds of this?  If 2 people were packing heat, how many others were?

What the fuck is the matter with you people?

I dont blame video games, television to this.  This is a bunch of people making poor decisions.  Thats right.  They DECIDED to kill each other.  They DECIDED to walk this path.  This Christmas Season, these 2 men decided that taking a life was the most important thing in the world.  I dont think it started like that.  I think the first guy wanted to scare the other into letting his girlfriend have the toy.  I bet he was fucking surprised to see the other son of a bitch had a gun and was going to defend himself. I guess at that point, the die was cast.

Innocent children and adults filling the store on the first official day of the christmas shopping season, and 2 men decided they didnt care.  When its all over, do the respective women consider the choices they made in boyfriends?

Do we have to think about metal detectors at Toys R Us?  Vons?  Macys?

ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS?  DO WE HAVE TO DO ALL OF OUR SHOPPING ONLINE NOW BECAUSE OF YOU ASSHOLES?

Merry Fucking Christmas you assholes.  The only bad news here is that you didnt live long enough to get sent to prison where you end up married to a couple of mean men.

John Lyle

That rush of uplifting hope you felt at 9pm pst tonight?  That was the collective cheer of hope that rushed through the country when hearing the news.

Barack Obama elected 44th President of the United States of America.

You didnt feel it?  Thats ok. You can watch if you want.

Or you can be a part of the solution.  Its up to you.

Obama will win the election with a larger margin of electoral and popular vote than George Bush ever did.  Does he have a mandate?

I dont think so. I think he will win by 6 or 7 percent after all the vote is counted, but when you talk about mandate, the electoral college is irrelevant.

Obama talks a very good centrist game.  I think hes going to have to govern from closer to the middle.

Is this the end of the culture war?  Is this the end of the republican party as we have known it?  Seriously, think about it:

John McCain was never a hard core righty until 2001 or so.  He knew he had to start sucking up to the right wing scum that Atwater and Rove had so heavily courted.

Today, they realized they created a monster.  We have heard about all the finger pointing, but frankly I think McCain lost it when he picked Palin.  I am sick and tired of listening to Pat Buchanan talking about the 10 point bump in the polls, then the economy hit blah blah blah.  She would have still been interviewed by Gibson and Couric.  They did not vet this woman.  She did not do her homework after she was picked.  She was an absolute disaster for the ticket.

I have never experienced anything like this.  The cheering in the streets of Denver, the happiness in the air and the general feeling of relief.

The end draws nigh.  Not the end of the world.  The relief that the end of having extremist right wing division rammed down our throats.  The relief that a common sense administration and congress was on the way.

Yes people.  It was a mandate.  Not a huge mandate.  not a 500 to 38 mandate.

But it was way bigger than either Bush win and you all know it.  When you go to bed at night and stare at the ceiling, you know that this was a resounding referendum on the last 8 years.   There is even a possibility that the democrats will achieve a filibuster proof majority.  If not now, for sure in 2010.

In retrospect, I laugh at myself for panicking.  For even thinking that after the last 8 years that our country would elect John McCain and that preliterate moron, Sarah Palin.

But I did.

And no.  We are not a center right country.  More on that later.

California has a number of ballot initiatives that do, in fact, affect my life in one way or another. Several affect my wallet, several affect my spirit.

I was able to gleefully vote my wallet AND my spirit.

Seriosuly, early voting in California has gotten really bad. I had to travel in 2004 as well, so I early voted then. I was able to go to the Jackie Robinson center in pasadena to early vote. THIS year, I was forced to go to the county registrar in Norwalk of all places.

Upon arriving (and parking in the wrong lot which gave me something to worry about all day), i walked all the way around the building before finding the end of the line. By my estimate, the line was about 500 yards long.

I immediately made friends with my “linemates”. They are Keion and His mother, Maegan, Shannon (I mention them by name because they are rather public figures), a pair of sisters, and later 2 more of Maegan and Shannons friends. Maegan has a rather fabulous blog at www.maegancarberry.com. Keion, Maegan, Shannon and her other friend Megan (sounds like a line from the Bob Newhart show) I found to be extremely engaging. More importantly, they were (in my judgement) interesting, interested people.

Most importantly, these people were “movers and shakers”. Maegan is the former chief of staff for Arianna Huffington. These are the young progressives in our world today.

My son is voting up in berkeley tomorrow. His facebook status said “Shane is nervous and excited about what could be one of the most important things he’ll do in his lifetime tomorrow. Remember to vote tomorrow! “

And it was Maegan who said “I have waited all my life to vote for a competent person…I can wait another 3 hours”

Keion is a recruiter for a major university and is clearly interested in making his mark in his field. His mother works 2 jobs and was voting early because she wasnt sure she would have time between jobs.

Maybe im way too hold to be cool now. I feel very good about our future with youth like this. These are positive and motivated people. It was very infectious. And for a few moments in my life, I felt young and cool again.

It turns out I am actually not as unconnected as I thought, as I ran into my old friend, colleague and former comrade, Mike and his gf (wife yet?) Robin. Mike and I actually go back 4 years. He is an ace unix sysadmin, so if you are in need of his services, please let me know!

We all split up when we got to the “tent” and waited our turn in line. I made sure I didnt miss my call. In the back of my mind I wondered if my voter registration had been kicked back. Why hadnt I gotten my card? What the hell was wrong now.

When my number was called, I didnt hestitate to make an ass out of myself, charging up the aisle like I was on the Price is Right. I waved at my new friends as I passed them.

When I was handed my ballot (with my name on it), I actually paused. I felt like I had some serious power. I felt a rush of images pass through my head, of everyone who ever died for this country, of everyone who has ever suffered, for everyone who has been disenfranchised.

Of everyone who was ever enslaved.

I said it.

Im sure Im being overly dramatic. Its one vote. Who gives a fuck?

Im 42 years old. I grew up in a very bigoted blue blood social register southwest bluebook family. I love my mother and my father, but I didnt grow up like them. I learned that black people were PEOPLE, not black, as an adult. I learned that mexican people were just like people like me that spoke a different language that ironically, i became fluent in as I went through school.

I wielded my pen as though it was excalibur. Holy, mighty, doer of only good deeds and I used it to vote for a good man. A highly educated, highly competent black man and his running mate – just as competent and intelligent and good.

I voted for compassion for drug users and livestock and childrens hospitals. I was cruel and unyielding to billionaire businessmen who pretended to give a fuck about our environment.

I thought about my wife and my children. And I saw that Obama logo in my head, and the one word that has signified his campaign:

Hope

I got chills as I marked my circle for Obama. I choked up a little bit.

We are making history.

For your viewing pleasure, I provide a new commercial from progressive future…check out the Paul Simon tune!

John Lyle

Certainly, many of these fabulous citizens of the United States of America deserve special coverage.  For your own entertainment and my editorializing here are what I think to be some of the top stories in the last week.

1.  Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R) 6th District in Minnesota.

If memory serves me, it is considered proper etiquette to refer to a congressman in the third person as “The Honorable” as in “The Honorable Michele Bachmann”.  I think if you watch the now famous Chris Matthews interview with her, honorable will not be a word you would use.  I urge you all to watch this outstanding interview:

Not to detract from the absolute hilarity of watching this doe eyed botox queen jackass lean into a punch with her chin, it is fair to say this woman is a moron.  People who vote for people like this are morons.  Michele Bachmann was listed in Esquire Magazine this month as one of the worst congresspeople in office.  This is a woman who had Disneys Aladdin banned from a public library viewing because some people might see its usage of witchcraft as inappropriate.  I personally dont like watching people cry, but if she loses her contest, I will thoroughly enjoy watching her cry at her concession speech.  Her opponent, Elwyn Tinklenberg, has received 1.3 million dollars in donations since the interview and the RNC has pulled all of its own ads supporting her from the state.  It may be too little too late, but I have faith in a reconvergence of sanity in our country.  The race is now officially considered a toss-up.

Since we brought up Michele Bachmann, we certainly must bring up this years round of Republican fear mongering, we can mention the McCains robocalling campaign and this weeks deployment of smearfest v3.8.  According to this weeks robocalls, we have Mayor 9/11 Rudy Giuliani telling us:

Obama will be soft on criminals, doesnt support federal sentencing guidelines for sex offenders, drug dealers and violent offenders.

FACT:  Barack Obama does, in fact, support federal guidelines for sentencing. Dont trust me, check his website

Obamas Plan to lower taxes on the middle class and “spread the wealth around” amounts to socialism

FACT:  Obama will return the tax rates to the Clinton era tax rates. The mere notion that we have a progressive tax system is DESIGNED to “redistribute wealth”.  This has been the system since woodrow wilson implemented the income tax.  For those who are home schooled, Woodrow Wilson was president during World War I.

FACT:  John McCain voted AGAINST George Bush’s tax cuts back in 2001.  I say again:

JOHN MCCAIN VOTED AGAINST THE BUSH TAX CUT THAT HE IS FIGHTING TO SAVE TODAY.

Syllogism would heretofore conclude that  John McCain a socialist.  Republican logic, however, is a special breed of logic.  Home schoolers might understand the term “opposite day” better…or the ever ready “I am rubber you are glue” defense.

FACT:  (uh oh.another fact for the same argument) 98% of small businesses earn less than 250,000.00 per year.  Therefore they would be NOT ONE EXTRA DIME.

2. Colin Powells endorsement.

Remember Colin Powell fuckers?  He was your darling back in 2001.  In 2002 he was conned into walking into the U.N. with Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz’s fable about Saddams Weapons of Mass Destruction.  Remember that, you fuckers?  Yes…since that day, Powells career took a nosedive and our President, backed by 50 million mouth breathing morons in 2004, have sent 4000 american men and women to die in that middle eastern shithole in a ham fisted plan engineered by chickenhawk Donald Rumsfeld.

Mission Accomplished.

Sunday Colin Powell endorsed Barack Obama.  He said nothing that a majority of Americans haven’t been saying.

3. Sarah Palin the clothes horse
I understand that its expensive to be a woman. I believe this to be another method of social engineering.
Is there some reason, however, that she needs 150k worth of clothes for 8 weeks? Furthermore, I contend that spinning your “joe the plumber” fables at rallies in Louboutins and Dior is somewhat of a dichotomy.
“Oh come on, John, you are making a mountain out of a molehill”
I merely bring this up as yet another indication of GOP double standards. How does it look to be greeting the right wing base in their clothes from Target and Monkey Ward in 4,000.00 worth of duds?
Furthermore, how do you justify that IN YOUR HEAD? Is it safe to assume that she doesnt think about it?
I think that Sarah Palins expenditure (20grand!) in airfares for her kids to attend state events they werent invited to speaks volumes about the clothing issue.
No. She doesnt think about it. God has seen fit to do this for her.
Have fun at your depositions this week, honey.
I have read numerous articles (some slanted, some not) regarding Obamas seeming inability to “close the deal” on this race. Quite frankly I am still apprehensive myself. While California is a blue state lock for Obama, we will still be voting.
However what I find more telling is how stupid people still are, especially after the last 8 years, regardless of the current economic nightmare. Here is a story you will love – watch Palin supporters during the VP debate:

Nice

Look how people laugh when Joe Biden chokes up a little bit. Just after, notice Palins complete inability to even momentarily empathize. Mother of the year.
A woman in Ohio was recently quoted as she planned to vote McCain because she is of the understanding that Obama “…thinks people like us are trash…”.
Of course Obama never said that. In the helping field, this statement would be called a “transference”. A transference is what people do when they feel a certain way about themselves but prefer not to acknowledge it. Instead they “transfer” this feeling to someone else, in this case, to Michelle and Barack Obama.
There is a new NBC interview of McCain and Palin that will be released fully in the next 2 days. I look forward into leaning into that one.
Todays definition of the day:
Socialism: Paraphrasing – this is where the government owns everything. Look it up in a dictionary.
We are fighting for our very lives. Be vigilant. Have hope.

John Lyle

I removed his last name to protect him from his own stupidity and highlighted the time he posted.  Also note that I am

1.  A Crazy Liberal

2.  A socialist

Apparently he was really mad.  Or really bored.  Or both.  Maybe the WoW servers are down.  Here is his second email 2 MINUTES LATER.

Apparently I am unemployed, leaching off the wealthy and am a socialist waste of life. Ironically, James is the one who is up at 2:28am trolling a silly facebook group sending hatemail.

I was in fact, in bed.  I will certainly not dignify the statement with how many hours I put into work yesterday.  However I went back to my house that I bought with my hard earned money after a full day and put in some more work from home.

<MARLONPERKINSVOICE>

Here we are witnessing the witless and vitriolic renderings of the uneducated.  Take note of the lack of specifics – empirical evidence is not the hallmark of the neocon wingnut – frothing and barely intelligible despite the availability of spellchecking, “IM Speak” and buzzwords such as “Socialist” and “Liberal” are tossed about with wreckless abandon.  They are masters of “modem courage”.  They would never speak this way to people in real life. Their bookshelves are filled with material written by the “Literati” of the right wing:  Coulter, Kristol, Frumm, Hannity, O’Reilly.  They seek out the hate merchants for their material.  Their television experience consists of Faux News. Anyone who doesnt see the world as they do are “socialists, lazy, liberal, unemployed, unproductive”.They clearly dont read much, as I didnt actually start the group….however as I mentioned earlier, the evidence isnt important to uneducated troglodytes such as James

</MARLONPERKINSVOICE>

For the record, James response was based on the following set of FACTS as I laid them down in the group “Sarah Palin doesnt know fuck about shit”

FACT: McCain didnt pick this stupid brain dead fucknozzle. Tim LaHaye and James dobson (Those champions of constitutional law and compassion) did.

FACT: Her “Stunt Value” wore off after the Charlie Gibson interview

FACT: The Levi/Bristol Palin wedding is NOT a shotgun wedding – its more likely a 7mm winnie mag or 30-06 wedding.

FACT: John McCains judgement was gone the moment he announced LaHaye and Dobsons pick for running mate

FACT: She will singlehandedly make the republican party irrelevant for a longer period quicker than George W Bush

Cletus from San Diego has nothing except name calling, as you have seen.

It sounds alot like the McCain campaign, doesnt it?  Ironically, James is a nurse by profession.  Wouldnt you all love to have him caring for you in surgery?  What if he finds out you are a transient or on medicare?

Your parents must be so proud.

Pussy

A friend passed me a link today from blogger interrupted.

I urge you all to check this out.

First of all, major kudos to the author and cameraman.

There is a tremendous amount of material for me to be incredibly judgmental about.  Sticking with the theme of this post:  Cultural Pathology.  I have no idea if this is an existing field of study.

I was moved when I saw this video, and not in a positive way. If you didn’t bother to watch the video, the scene is the parking lot outside a McCain/Palin Rally

Oh, and gosh, I guess im generalizing too.

So my question is this:  At what point do these worshipers begin showing up with torches and pitchforks?

George Will thinks McCain should get off this Ayers thing.

In fact the only people who dont think he should get off the Ayers thing are people whose judgement might not be so great. People like Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter and Sean Hannity come to mind first.

If im not mistaken, these are people who have complained bitterly about McCains lack of coherence and unified message.

So with Trillions of dollars missing from IRAs over the last 3 weeks, isnt it somewhat specious and unpresidential to try and insinuate with fear tactics that Obama is a terrorist?

It would seem at this point that all Senator McCain has left is his twice daily choirs to preach at.  Lathering up the conservative “base”, as it were.  Perhaps we can invoke the secret Jesus magic of the “bradley effect”.

But I digress.  Witnessing this video is disturbing at best.  If we are to assume these people ALL think the same, I would have to change my characterization to terrifying.  I would consider myself one who can lose himself to the warm gooshiness of passion, however these are angry stupid people.  These are sick people.  These are people with a world view unlike any I have witnessed.  Dont get me wrong, I know a fair amount of flat earth hyper conservative people.  However the crowd in Strongsville takes this 10 steps further.

It reminds me of the Salem Witch Hunt.  Do you guys remember that?:  Thats when rich white men came up with an excuse to steal land from widowed women in Salem (Brookline), Massachusetts 300 years ago.  Women lived in abject fear for their lives and the lives of their children.

What is the matter with you people?  Cant you get some help for this condition?  Clearly you caught this malady somewhere.

Come on, Strongsville peasant farmers. Put down your pitchforks.  You and I both know he isnt a terrorist.  You’re just bitter because 8 years ago you were wrong.  4 years ago you were wrong again.  Today you are still wrong.  The same stupid shit that comes out of McCains mouth is just another 4 years of that brain dead hick carpetbagger from Greenwich, CT via West Texas.

And for God’s sake would you please let this old man lose this election with some FUCKING dignity?  I think another thing we can agree on (remember we agreed earlier that Obama isnt a terrorist) is that if McCain starts up with Ayers, Wright, Rezko, Barney, Voldemort and whoever else you maggots can think up, then hes going to have to relive Keating, Iran-Contra, John Hagee, Rick Davis, Phil Gramm and UBS, Carly and her AWFUL botox job and Carl Linder (to name a few).

But then again, from the party that sends thousands of our children to die in the middle eastern shithole that we built while Osama bin Laden runs free, since YOU have nothing to lose in an attack like what you beg McCain to do, why the fuck would any of you care?

Just pass your disease along to your children.  Eventually you will die out.

Its called evolution.

John Lyle

There were people in the audience laughing at this.

What kind of trash laughs at this? Who are you people? I actually got choked up, as did my wife. To be honest, at that point in time, there were few people on this earth that I had more respect for.

You laugh at this man? Do you laugh because you are incapable of empathizing? Did I miss the joke here?

Seriously. I want to know.

Is it because your ideology is more important than human decency? Is your ideo(path)ology so overwhelming that inappropriate laughter is your only response?

What was so FUCKING FUNNY? I want to know. I want to know which one of you toothless, fat, slobbering troglodytes would choose to laugh at the notion that Joe Biden (or ANYONE) would have a moment of pain and fear when considering his situation after the loss of his wife in a horrific car accident.

Which one of you cowards has the gonads to lay it on me. Admit that you are sick, explain why it is that demogoguery outweighs human compassion. Why do you laugh at Joe Bidens tears, you sick little puke?

How sad that you would cheer for Sarah Palins lack of acknowledgement as she droned on into another one of her notecards about being mavericky and a reformer, as she hides from legally issued and enforced subpoenaes and abdicates her governorship to the McCain campaign.

How sad that you cheer division, pain and suffering.

How ironic that you have no message or plan other than hate and lie in your bid to bring honor and dignity to the white house.

Sure you do.

Im talking about the 2008 Presidential campaign.

Are you going to admit that you know WHO I am talking about?

Does your mom need to read this to you?

If you are wondering who I am talking about, then I call you a liar and a cynic.  Dont bother reading the rest of the post.  You are too far gone.

For those of you who (even relunctantly) admit to understand what I am talking about, then you have acknowledged that John McCain is currently running the sleaziest campaign in “modern history”.  Dont take my word for it, go ahead and read here:

Some of the truly mouth breathing jackasses will scream “liberal media”.  If the Washington Post, Associated Press and Los Angeles Times is too liberal for you, perhaps you would prefer Bill O’Reilly who attacks McCains sleazy ads.

At some point I have to wonder if people are just plain stupid.

But I think its actually 2 kinds of people.

1.  Cynics – you are the people that know its all bullshit but no one cares as long as they win.  They are devoid of any honor, integrity or ethics, yet you are people who stake a claim on ethics and honor.  You are typically beneficiary of legislation and or tax rules that benefit you.

2.  Idiots – You can also be referred to as Ignorant. Idiots can be subcategorized as well. You arent in the tax bracket of the cynics, but you so desperately wish you were.  You are most likely culture warriors.  You are anti-choice, you believe that fairy tales should be taught (or even debated) in public school science classes, you think abstinence will make the problem of teenage pregnancy go away and the most extreme of you think that the constitution should be abolished in lieu of biblical rule.

To one extent or another, you also believe in many of the following:

Gay couples do not deserve the same legal status as a straight married couple

The pledge of allegiance was written (and recited) by our founding fathers in its current form (with the “under God” part)

Science is bad (all or part).  Examples would be stem cell research, space exploration that may lead to discovery of extraterrestrial live and of course evolution (See Fairy Tales earlier).

That the United States is a “Christian Nation”.

Al Quaeda was in Iraq before 9/11 and had Saddam Hussains assistance in the 9/11 attacks.

The War on Terror began in and will end in Iraq

Democrats (all liberals) are bad. It is your core belief that Communism is a tiny step away from being liberal.

Call me old fashioned. I learned to drive a volkswagen beetle in Mexico when I was 14. We were spending several weeks in Mexico. I learned to drive on the runway they used in the movie “Catch 22″ where there wasnt anyone else and I couldnt kill anyone except myself.

Can one of you morons explain to me where you learned that it was OK to drive your beast of an automobile in a manner that makes truckers look like a scene from “Driving Miss Daisy”?

Before you take offense at me for calling you morons (just get over it. You know its true AT LEAST every time you put gas in your car), consider todays experience of mine. As I was merging onto the freeway, clearly ahead of the lovely yummy mummy in her X5, I put on my right turn signal (thats right, the onramp lands in the middle of the freeway, so cars actually have to LOOK where they are going).

The turn signal clearly means to her “Speed up so i can keep him from merging.” She is quite successful in her tactic, as I am unable to speed up or slow down to get into the lane I need. My heart began to pound as the drama unfolded. My offramp was a mere 600 feet away, and I had no where to go. Was I going to have to drive an extra mile before exiting the freeway or could I perhaps negotiate with this woman for an extra 12 feet of space for my little PT Cruiser?

Things looked grim for me. I thought for sure I was lost. I started to sweat. I started to swear, thinking about how much the extra 2 miles would cost me in gasoline. I wished for this womas death…how dare she take food from my family’s table!

But I was saved. I was saved by, of all things, the cell phone. In a split second, she looked down and snapped open her cellphone (no doubt the bejewelled Paris Hilton kind). As she became immediately lost in the importance of her conversation, she meandered just enough for me to squeeze in.

Did she relent? Did she finally decide that the extra 12 feet she consumed would not garner her enough of an advantage to wherever she was going that she could be generous to me?

I was relieved when the answer came clearly with the sounding of her horn. She had NOT intended me to win our imaginary powerstruggle over NOTHING. She was angry that I caught her sleeping….behind the wheel of her 4,000 lb BMW Mastodon.

I won her. Neener Neener. Sure, she might have moved over a lane, sped up and flipped me the bird (with her other hand holding the cell phone, not the wheel), but I won her.

She will return home and have the gardener pick the remnants of bigwheels, roadkill, small children and mobile hot dog carts from the fender and grill of her car. She will thrash around in bed, knowing I won her…keeping her from her destination by a whole .3 seconds.

Whats worse….is that she wont do any of that. She will think Im just an asshole and forget about it. She will never learn. She will put 75.00 worth of gas in her tank every 3 days and never think about the men and women dying in a middle eastern shithole while Halliburton and the Oil Companies get rich off of the morons like her.