Do they care it's Christmas?

Say y’all heard of this jolly bearded dude named Santa Claus?  Megyn Kelly over at Fox News has caused all kinds of creatures to stir by insisting that Santa Claus is white.  I think maybe she got Santa confused with Frosty the Snowman.  Everyone knows that Santa Claus is just a metaphor for the year-end orgy of commerce and consumption facilitated by global capitalism.  Whether that makes Santa white or black, American or other, no one can really say.  But one thing's for sure: the elves are Chinese.  

Can't we compromise with Obgyn Kelly and just say that Santa Claus is half white and half black, like Obama?  Oh wait.  I can see how that might be a problem to certain someones.  Back to the white board, I mean the blackboard, I mean the drawing board. 

Duck duck oops

Aww sheez y'all heard of this crazy bearded dude down in Louisiana who hunts ducks on TV and hates gays in his spare time?  What am I saying, of course you have.  Phil Robertson of Duck Dynasty fame is in big trouble after making blatantly homophobic comments in an interview with GQ magazine.  

The homophobic comments were no doubt outrageously offensive, but I'm surprised that some of his racist comments have flown under the radar.  I found his claim that the black people he grew up with in Jim Crow-era Louisiana were never mistreated to be astoundingly ignorant.  He paints a picture of black people singing in the cotton fields, happily working for the white man without a care in the world, until the twin plagues of "entitlement" and "welfare" rode into town and turned that idyllic world into hell.  It's a hard sell.  I'm definitely not buying it, and I think you'd have to be racist, or at least really fucking clueless, to do so.  I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and say he's just willfully ignorant.  Although this picture of him in blackface is a bit suspicious...

For shame.

Anyway, like pretty much everything that happens on Earth these days, people’s reactions to the event are far more interesting than the event itself.  Sides were immediately taken, with Team Duck receiving kind words and support from none other than the governor of Louisiana, Jobby Bindle (I especially like the Spoonerized version of his name because the imagery wonderfully captures his transformation from sitting Governor to itinerant Presidential hopeful, traversing the country with one hand grasping the polka-dotted bindlestick slung over his shoulder while the other hand sheepishly rocks a tin can back and forth as he ingratiates himself with GOP power brokers).  Jindal/Robertson 2016.  You heard it here first.  And hopefully last. 

I don't know how I feel about A&E indefinitely suspending Robertson.  It's certainly their right to do so, but it seems like an empty gesture that won't make anything better.  It's also leading to quite the backlash, and I'm not so sure A&E wants the spotlight shined on it instead of on Phil Robertson.  After all, this is the network that once aired such highbrow fare as Beethoven's Fidelio and Agatha Cristie's Poirot, but has now resorted to airing Duck Dynasty, Criss Angel Mindfreak, Dog the Bounty Hunter, and about 38 different reality shows with the word "war" in the title e.g. Parking Wars, Storage Wars, Dancing With The Wars, Shipping Wars, Shopping Wars, Puppy Wars, Curb Your Warthusiasm, Pawn Shop Wars, Wars & Recreation, etc. etc. etc.  It's not too difficult to imagine tons of people of boycotting A&E and discovering that they're really not missing out on anything.  It would be in A&E's best interest to let all this be water under the bridge, or I guess water off a duck's back. 

It's not like Phil Robertson would have a hard time getting a new TV gig if he wanted one.  His life story just screams cable TV: he grew up dirt poor in northern Louisiana, got a football scholarship to Louisiana Tech (an oxymoron on par with 'Kansas City'), turned into a violent alcoholic who kicked his wife and kids out of the home, and finally, as sure as the sockeye salmon will swim hundreds of miles upstream to spawn before dying, completed the life cycle of the angry young Southern male by renouncing his sinful ways and accepting Jesus Christ as his savior.  Jesus tests really well in focus groups across all key demographics in America, which is pretty much unheard of for a Middle Easterner.  If I were in charge of programming over at Fox News, I'd just hand the entire weekend over to Phil Robertson.  He could have a cooking show where he grills up some shrimp while Sean Hannity accuses the remoulade of being communist.  

Obviously I'm not a fan of Phil Robertson's screwy socially conservative beliefs, but I also have a problem with the duck call he invented.  It just doesn't seem fair.  As if a human brain, camouflage, opposable thumbs, and hunting rifles weren’t enough unfair advantages, we had to go and introduce duck calls into the mix?  I just hope when the aliens come to take over Earth they have really weird voices and are incapable of mimicking human speech, to at least give us a fighting chance.  Wouldn’t it be something if aliens from, say, the seventh moon of Alpha Rigel DQX-17 show up here in a few years with a machine that precisely mimics human speech and use said machine to assist in their invasion and then later admit they got the idea while watching reruns of Duck Dynasty?  I bet y’all Duck Dynasty fans would sure feel stupid then.   

In conclusion, here is a list of things that I, as a heterosexual man, find more desirable than a man’s anus: 1) female anus; 2) ducks; 3) squirrels; 4) killing things including but not limited to items two and three; 5) our new alien overlords from Alpha Rigel DQX-17, provided they are not into male-on-male butt stuff.  Seriously, those gay Rigelians gross me out.  God created Zurmplek and Borp, NOT Zurmplek and Glorp!!!   

Pay no attention to the phallic object in my mouth.

Children of a lesser fraud

Aww man y'all heard that Nelson Mandela died last week?  I don't know much about world history but I heard he was this dude who got put in prison on some island for like 27 years before finally busting out and heading to Mexico.  I think they made a movie about it and Morgan Freeman played him.  But yeah, it's really sad that he's dead.  I just hope his son Howie is holding up okay.  

Anyway the big news now is how crazy Mandela's memorial service was.  Apparently President Obama was invited to it but he spent the whole time taking selfies with the Danish Prime Minister and making out with Raul Castro.  Such bad manners.  I was really excited when I heard that Elton John was going to be there to perform a retooled version of one of his classics, but I was expecting something along the lines of "Mandela in the Wind" rather than "Funeral for a Friend".    

But all those things pale in comparison to the utterly unfathomable weirdness of the service's sign language interpreter.  Thamsanqa Jamtjie, the ANC-approved interpreter, was actually a fraud.  Somehow he was allowed to take the stage and remain there for hours, basically doing the Macarena or whatever else cheremic gibberish he could dream up while dignitaries from all over the world gave heartfelt speeches unaware of the troll standing 3 feet away from them flashing baseball signs.  So if any of y'all were wondering why David Cameron stole home at the end of Obama's speech, now you know.  

That Jamtjie's meaningless "self-invented" gestures could command a place onstage at such a major global event is emblematic of a world in which delusional self-confidence and bluster have superseded actual competency.  And for that, he deserves to be rewarded.  Move over, Pope Francis.  Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Thamsanqa Jamjtie, TIME magazine's 2013 Person of the Year!

 

Upon hearing of his unexpected accolade, Thamsanqa Jantjie released this statement: “Many thanks, [right hand forms claw for five seconds while left hand extends pinkie finger] squeeze be informed how is why [sign of letter C five times in rapid succession] such governor of essence [uninterrupted jazz hands for thirteen minutes] and forbid suffer of correspondence marble future.  Again, [right hand forms fist and moves in alternating clockwise and counterclockwise circles for ten seconds] silent walnut [rocking motion of left hand for twelve seconds] much victorious marble future.  Marble future [conducts imaginary symphony in D flat minor for thirty seven minutes] enjoy always.”

 They also made a movie about him.

This will be my testimony

“We have a severe baby problem here in Hawai'i.  Every time I see a baby, it makes me angry.  So I just take its stroller, emptying out the contents first, of course (I'm no monster), and smash it with a sledgehammer until it’s inoperable.  I destroy them so they can’t be pushed on the streets.  And if I see a baby asleep at the bus stop or park during the night, I’m fine with that.  I won't do anything.  But if I see a baby asleep during the day, nuh-uh, that’s unacceptable.  I wake that lazy baby right up and bark at them, ‘get your ass moving!’  When you are walking down the street carrying a sledgehammer and wearing a garland of tiny baby skulls around your neck, people get out of your way. "

cf. some evil piece of shit state legislator from Hawai'i (who's a Democrat by the way, so can't no one accuse Shaq of being partisan anymore).

Cocaine Brothers

Haha say y'all heard of this crack-smoking Canadanian dude Rob Ford?  He's the current Mayor of Canada and his brother Drug Ford is a City Councillor.  The Fords of Toronto are a political dynasty much like the Fords of Detroit are an automotive and losing football dynasty.  Rob Ford hails from a part of Toronto called, appropriately enough, Etobicoke.  He's only 44 years old but he's got one of those faces of meth things going on where he looks like he's actually in his 60s.  He'd be great as Toronto's official mascot or Town Crier or comically fat Sheriff, but as Mayor he leaves a lot to be desired.  In addition to the whole crack scandal he's been accused of corruption, racism, sexual harassment, plus this one time he fell down while trying to throw a football and it was pretty hilarious.  I guess Canadians are just as stupid about their politicians as we Americans are, seeing as how Ford has refused to step down yet still has ardent supporters.

Rob Ford sound asleep at a city council meeting held for some reason at Caesar's Palace.

Everyone's having a field day making fun of Rob Ford's striking resemblance to such plumpy spheres as Chris Farley, Rush Limbaugh, John Wayne Gacy, and Grimace, but if you ask me Ford looks and acts most similar to Baron Harkonnen from the movie Dune. 

Crack is the mind-killer.  Crack is the little death that brings total obliteration.

I think ol’ Baron Fordkonnen should lay off the spice, know what I’m saying?  Looks like he’s been trained by the Denny’s Gesserit, am I right?   

Upon his election in 2010  he was hailed by Canadian conservatives as the arrival of the Kwisatz Haderach, a long awaited messianic figure who would lead them to a position of supreme power not just in Toronto, but throughout all of Ontario and even into the Maritime Provinces that's a thing right?  Those are real places?  I don't know much about Canadia.  Unfortunately for Canadian conservatives, after this scandal Ford is looking more like an Ersatz Cadillac. 

As if the crack scandal wasn't enough of a PR nightmare, Ford later badly bungled a press conference held for the express purpose of denying allegations of sexual harassment.  Talking about his accuser, he said (apparently without any regard for how poorly his crudeness would go over) that he would never "eat her pussy" because he was happily married and thus "had enough to eat at home."  

Speaking of having enough to eat at home, guess who doesn't?  That's right, poor Americans who have to resort to government assistance such as food stamps just to, as Dubya would say, put food on their family.  Well a lot of assholes in Congress want to require hungry poor people to pass a drug test in order to be eligible to receive food stamps.  One such asshole is Representative Trey Radel, a Republican (big surprise) from Florida (shocker!).  Radel's stance would be fine (albeit heartless) if he himself hadn't pled guilty to cocaine possession a couple of weeks ago.  So now this hypocritical piece of shit has, unlike Ford, agreed to take a leave of absence and go to rehab.  I suppose this is a good thing, but I'd have preferred if Radel's response to getting caught was even crazier than Ford's.  Like he and his fellow Congressional druggies (and you just know there's a bunch of them) should have dressed as Native Americans and taken to the Potomac to dump gallons upon gallons of their drug-tainted urine samples into it.  And maybe afterwards they could set up a plank and force poor people to walk it, and upon splashing into the freshly beurined waters the poors would be greeted by a bunch of Pee Party Congressional interns dressed as alligators and armed with hacksaws.  The internagator who emerged from the Potomac with the most trophies (aka amputated poor person hands) would win like a $50 Starbucks gift card or something.  I dunno, maybe an iPod Nano also if that's even a thing anymore. 

Phin de siecle

Damn y’all heard of the Miami Dolphins?  That team is in turmoil fa sho ever since it was revealed that this dude Richie (yes really that’s his real first name, he’s an adult human male with the first name Richie) Incognito (yes really that’s his real last name, not a vestige of a stage-named porn past or something the FBI dreamed up as part of the witness relocation program, he’s an adult human male with the last name Incognito) has been hazing/harassing/tormenting/extorting his Fins teammate and fellow offensive lineman Jonathan Martin.  The Dolphins already kicked Incognito off the team so now the poor guy doesn’t even have a beach to take his talents to.  

People have been asking me if there was any hazing in the NBA.  There was a little bit of the veterans giving the rooks a hard time, but nothing like what goes down in the NFL.  I mean sure, there was this one time I urinated in ma boy Dwyane Wade's Gatorade, but c'mon, that was classic!  We were playing the Detroit Pistons and he asked me what a 'piston' even was, so I said to him, I said "SHEEEIT, I JUST 'PISTON' YOUR GATORADE SON OH SHIT BURN SON AH HA HA LOLZ!!!"  We all had a good laugh about it once he got out of the hospital.  Oh yeah, we went on to win the NBA championship the next season.  I don't think that's a coincidence.  

So there you go, scientific proof that hazing works, at least in the NBA.  I think maybe, maybe Incognito took things too far, but more likely he's just misunderstood, right?  So he called Martin a “half-nigger” which let’s be real, coming from a racist that’s really like half a compliment.  And so he threatened to shit in Martin’s mouth which let’s be real, coming from a developmentally arrested manboy that’s actually kinda sweet.  And then he went on to threaten to slap Martin’s mom across the face which let’s be real, coming from an irredeemably psychopathic asshole that’s actually somewhat considerate.  Hmm now that I think about it, I totally agree with the surprisingly large number of NFL players, sports media, and fans on Team Richie who say that Jonathan Martin was being a wuss by not fighting back.  

Yes, all you concussion-addled former and current NFLers and all you meathead athlete-manque Twitter warriors who took Incognito's side during all this, you are completely correct.  Jonathan Martin's refusal to inflict physical harm on a teammate is just another example of what so many of the leading intellectual lights of the Intertubes are calling the "pussification" of the NFL.  Don't you just love that word, "pussification"?  What a marvelous pejorative.  After all, what could be worse than a vagina, amirite???  What we need to do is promote the PENISIFICATION OF MURKA!  Back in, for instance, Mike Ditka's time you could unwind after a long hard girthy day of tackling your sweaty tights-wearing fellow man by filling a sock with ejaculate quarters and swinging it right in your secret crush rookie teammate's face and breaking his sweet trusting heart eye socket LIKE A REAL MAN WOULD.  If in the fevered attempt to prove your manhood you wind up forgetting your humanity, so what?  That's just medial collateral ligament damage IT HAPPENS IN WAR ALL THE TIME LOOK IT UP EINSTEIN.  FOOTBALL IS ANALOGOUS TO WAR AND PEPPERING THE INTERWEBS WITH PAEANS CELEBRATING LOCKER ROOM ABUSE IS JUST LIKE GOING ON A USO TOUR.  Man all this poissonification of the NFL is driving me crazy I mean dolphins aren't fish first of all.  USING VIOLENCE TO SOLVE YOUR PROBLEMS IS THE AMERICAN DREAM, but we all know that thanks to Obama the American Dream is dead.  I HOPE YOUR HAPY LIBRULS.
  
The worst part of this whole scandal was when Obama got on TV and said that if he had a fat son he would look just like Jonathan Martin.  And then upon winning reelection Chris Christie went on the air to announce if he had a clone he would look just like Richie Incognito.  Not to be outdone, Toronto mayor Rob Ford held a tear-filled press conference where he affirmed that if he had an American son he would look just like Richie Incognito.  But then Rush Limbaugh outdid them all by announcing that Richie Incognito was in fact his biological son, which pretty much explains everything about this whole mess. 

Full disclosure, I actually met Incognito once at a charity golf tournament in Miami.  I could tell he was a disturbed dude by the way he was treating one of the female volunteers (and I don’t mean Candace Parker).  He was poking at the woman’s vagina with his golf club (and curiously enough, I didn’t hear any meatheads complaining then that he was contributing to the "pussification" of golf).  I’ve seen insecure men use all sorts of things as a surrogate penis but that was definitely the first time I got to check off “9-iron” on my copy of Surrogate Penis Bingo.   

Speaking of surrogate penises, Incognito’s SUV had one of those “Eracism” bumper stickers so I didn’t have him pegged as a racist but turns out it was just an advertisement for his racist website.

God Hates Spags

Awww steeznart say y’all heard of this sport called football?  It's pretty much like basketball but without the dribbling and you have to wear tights instead of shorts.  As a child I actually dreamt of being an NFL running back before experiencing an unfortunate growth spurt.  No one wanted a 7'2" 350 pound halfback so I had to settle for being the best basketball player in NBA history.  Anyway it's the middle of football season and I'm excited because my favorite team, the New Orleans Saints, are 6-2 and on top of their division.  It's a substantial improvement from last year's disastrous 7-9 record.  The biggest reasons for the Saints' success this year are the return of head coach/Juicy Fruit enthusiast Sean Payton and the arrival of new defensive coordinator/carbohydrate enthusiast Rob Ryan. 

The Saints got rid of last year's defensive coordinator, Steve Spagnuolo, after just one season.  That might seem a bit rash but keep in mind that the Saints defense was statistically the worst defense of all time.  OF ALL TIME.  You know your shit is weak when Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church are protesting your defense’s ineptitude.  Apparently the 4-3 defense is an abomination in the eyes our Lord, so Phelps and his congregation picketed outside the Superdome before every home game last season, refusing to leave until Saints management promised to hire a new defensive coordinator and install a 3-4 defense.  

Now I'm no fan of Fred Phelps, but I gotta give him props for his role in convincing the Saints to bring in Rob Ryan.  Those Westboro Baptist Church folk may have some strange ideas about sexuality and funeral etiquette, but their church doctrine regarding NFL defensive schemes is surprisingly logical and well constructed.  As the Bible teaches us in Numbers 3:4,

“Nadab and Abihu, however, fell dead before the LORD when they made an offering with unauthorized fire before him in the Desert of Sinai.  They had no sons; so only Eleazar and Ithamar served as priests during the lifetime of their father Aaron.” 

I’m no expert of Biblical exegesis but even a layman can see that this passage prophesies that the switch to a 3-4 defense will lead the Saints to the promised land, i.e. East Rutherford, New Jersey for Super Bowl XLVIII where Rob Ryan, Sean Payton, and Drew Brees will direct the Saints to a dominant 38-10 victory over Jason Campbell's resurgent Cleveland Browns.  Sorry Browns fans.  I just don't think this is your year.     

Obamascare

Aww damn y'all heard how the gubmint tried to make a website but then it turnt out that the website they made wasn't really even that good of a website?  I hope Obama is impeached for this.  THE INDIVIDUAL MANDATE IS UNCONSTITUITIONAL.  Also I don't really know what the word "impeach" means.  Or the word "mandate".  I get that the gubmint is all shut down and shit, but you'd think that they could at least manage to get one simple little website to stay up and running.  I mean, how am I supposed to sign up for one of those vaunted death panels if I can't even get on the website?  

Even though the Obamacare website has been up for less than a week and Obamacare itself doesn't begin implementation for another few months, Obamacare is an unmitigated nation-ruining disaster the likes of which haven't been seen since the K-T extinction event 66 million years ago.  I guess in this analogy Obamacare is the asteroid, the Yucatan Peninsula is America, and dinosaurs are freedom.  

Librul pundits are making a big mistake if they think that conservatives essentially agree with the underlying provisions of Obamacare and are acting out against the law due to being reflexively enraged by the "Obama" part of Obamacare.  The truth is that I as well as most of my conservative peers are actually most enraged by the "care" part of Obamacare.  Why should the government be allowed to FORCE me to buy health care?  What if I don't believe in caring for my health?  Is that not my God-given right?  JESUS IS MY COPAY.

More to the point, why should I have to pay for the health care of others???!!!  That's as ridiculous as making me pay for the education of others, or the maintenance of infrastructure that others use, or the military protection of others.  Where will it stop?  Will I be forced by the gubmint to buy my neighbor a birthday present every year?  Or to mow his lawn for him every weekend?  Or to stop sleeping with his wife?  THIS IS AMERICA Y'ALL SHAQ GOT NEEDS TOO.

And anyway our horrible health care system is the primary economic engine of this nation, helping to create millions of jobs for coroners, grave diggers, bankruptcy lawyers, funeral directors, eulogy writers, and facial tissue manufacturers.  Most people are happy that American car manufacturing has made a comeback, but few people know that hearses account for over 70 percent of all new cars sold in America, according to the 2012 car census.  

Messiah Complex

Damn y’all heard about this judge in Tennessee what ordered a 7 month old baby boy’s name be changed from “Messiah” to something more acceptable?  According to Judge Lu Ann Ballew, there was only one Messiah in history and his name was Baby Jeebus, so to subject a little kid to such grandiose expectations is unfair.  That’s probably right.  Can you imagine the disappointment his mother would feel if little Messiah didn’t grow up to be the Word made Flesh and resurrect the dead and lead mankind into the promised land and preside over his eternal kingdom or whatever it is that messiahs are supposed to do and instead become a teacher or a lawyer or something?  Or, God forbid, a businessman?  Eww.  

Being in the world of professional sports, I personally know of a lot of athletes whose parents had high hopes for them and who projected that hope into their names, only to be disappointed as their children chose to become athletes.  Doc Rivers, my former coach when I was with the Celtics, was halfway through his residency in neuroplastibiolinguistinformatics when he abruptly quit to pursue a career in basketball.  Sure, he went back to finish up and can (and does) proudly carry the title of “Doctor”, but to this day his friends and family think of him as a failure.  My frenemy Kobe Bryant was named after the choicest, most succulent kind of beef, yet his flesh is actually quite stringy and gamey and honestly not even worth eating at all really, except maybe slow cooked in some sort of stew with at least two other delicious yet criminally underrated ingredients to cover for his flaws.  And don’t even get me started on Metta World Peace.   

Some might say the judge overreacted, but she’s right that being named Messiah would open the kid up to ridicule and bullying from his peers.  The judge was correct in forcing the mother to rechristen –uhh I mean rename her baby.  After all, being named Shaquille, I know a thing or two about names that get you bullied as a child.  That’s why I had my name legally changed to “Shaq-Fu”.  Now hardly anyone gives me wedgies during gym.  Also keep in mind this judge’s name is Lu Ann, which I believe is Appalachian for “chronic ringworm infections”.  So unfortunately she didn’t have anyone looking out for her when she was a child.  She just wants to make sure no one else has to go through what she and I had to go through.  

As a public service, Judge Lu Ann has compiled a list of names that Tennessean mothers should NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE give to their baby boys: Messiah; God; Stigmata; Adolf; Osama; Satan; Thad Matta; Francis; Pope Francis; Track; Bark; Trig; Algebra 2; Lindsey; Pope Benedict (probably just steer clear of Pope-anything); Ludacris (“Ludicrous” is acceptable, however); Jebediah; Mohammed; Mitt; Newt; Splat; Charmander; Willard; Rush; Reince; Erick Erickson; P. Diddy; Bulbosaur; Tucker; Channing; Bubba; Tim; Bubba Tim; Larry Joe; Jermichael; Jermetrius; Endojermetriosis; North West; Southwest; Lufthansa; Delicious; Johnny Football; Yrotagrup (“Purgatory” spelled backwards, for some reason this one is all the rage); George Arthur; Blanket; Snuggie; Prince; Prince Charming (you will get sued by Disney); Apple (you will get sued by Apple); D’Brickashaw; Herbert; Prescott; Lemuel; Vernon; Ferguson; Linus; Chip; Skip; Chirp; Burp; Mantonio; Piyush; Ho Lee Fuk; Bang Ding Ow; Sum Ting Wong; Wi Tu Lo; okay well this list is kinda getting too big huh?  

I guess the takeaway, women of Tennessee, is to stop having kids.  Just stop.  Don’t.  It’s simply not worth the hassle of potentially giving your child a name for which they may get made fun of.  This aligns perfectly with the government’s campaign to control every aspect of a woman’s reproductive system.  If women can’t be trusted to choose if and when to have a child in the first place, then of course they can’t be trusted to name the child.  I’d even go a step further.  I personally believe every female, upon entering childbearing age, should be issued a government-approved nickname for her ladyparts.  You know, something like “Ms. Thang” or “Princess Sparkles” or “Sasha Fierce” or “Easy Bake Love Oven” or "Shamesville U.S.A." or “STATE SANCTIONED FEMALE REPRODUCTIVE UNIT #223APC3023847500-2302”.  This would really help drive the point home that women don’t own their bodies.  Hopefully Judge Lu Ann Ballew will join the Tea Party, get elected to Congress, and write such a bill. 

Et tu America?*

Oh shit say y'all heard of this dude George Zimmerman?  That fool fatally shot Trayvon Martin and just got away with it.  It's weird to think that in this country an unarmed black teenager is considered fair game for a gun-toting adult, but I guess that's what our Founding Fathers had in mind when they designed our criminal justice system.  God bless America.  While I unequivocally disagree with the verdict, I can’t help but marvel at the effectiveness of the defense’s closing argument.  The picture that defense attorney Mark O'Mara painted was so precise, gripping, and evocative that I felt, as I'm sure the jury did, that I was right there alongside Zimmerman on that fateful February night in Florida as he fearlessly sacrificed his own safety to ensure the safety of his, yes his, neighborhood, a neighborhood beset by robbery and burglary and ebony, a neighborhood direly in need of a watch, a watch to be undertaken by a hero, not just any hero but an especially valiant hero who, not satisfied with merely watching, goes the extra mile and CAPTAINS SAID WATCH (our plucky hero presumably wears a tinfoil badge issued to him by the retired mall cop next door and has a neato decoder ring retrieved from the depths of a particularly foreboding box of Cap'n Crunch).  It was such a textbook example of compelling legal rhetoric that I just had to quote it in its entirety on this here blog of mine:

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, um, I mean ladies of the jury, look at my client.  Just look at him.  Do you really think that such a pudgy paranoid pants-pissing coward would stand a chance with anyone in a fair fight?  He had no choice but to use his gun.  I mean look at him.  Really look at him.  For fuck’s sake.  This is the same man, if you can even call him that, who once tearfully dialed 911 to report that he somehow got both hands caught in Pringles cans.  How he managed to dial the number, we’ll never know.  But that’s a matter for another time.  

"Trayvon Martin may have been unarmed, but he certainly had arms.  Two of them.  Which could be used to punch my client, or perhaps even poke his distended belly in an attempt to elicit a delightfully high-pitched squeal.  How was my client to know that the Skittles and iced tea Mr. Martin was carrying was not actually Mentos and Coke?  Can you imagine the carnage that Mr. Martin could inflict on my client if that were the case?  Surely my client, the pathetic loser that he is, and at this time I’d like to politely ask the jury to look at him one last time, just soak it all in, had reason to believe his life was in danger.  Now sure, if my client were charged with eating a marshmallow, I’d ask you to find him guilty of cannibalism.  But you cannot find him guilty of murder.  If you poke his stomach too many times, even the Pillsbury Doughboy has the right to stand his ground.  Or, if he’s too tired to stand, he can wallow in his unvacuumed ground, surrounded by Twinkie wrappers and empty Big Gulp cups, intently polishing his beloved gun/surrogate penis, visions of perp walks, shootouts, and car chases dancing in his head."  

 

*what Trayvon Martin’s brother tweeted after the verdict. 

Buttergate

Yo yo yo y’all heard of this TV chef named Paula Deen (sic)?  Her brother’s name is Earl, but that’s a bit too frou-frou for their target demographic (well it’s actually more of a Wal-Mart demographic), so he just goes by Bubba.  Well, Bubba Hiers is being accused of an assortment of unsavory acts against his workers.  I don’t really feel like going into detail.  Basically, imagine all the things you would expect someone named “Bubba Hiers” to do and you won’t be too far off.  Anyway, Paula was deposed as part of Bubba’s trial.  Her testimony revealed some pretty lurid details about her personal life, the creepiest of which was that she wanted to throw Bubba a wedding with a Southern plantation theme, replete with middle-aged black men dressed as slaves.  Yeah.  I’ve been to some weird weddings in my day, even one that was crashed by Dikembe Mutombo, but this one is a fridge too far.  

Understandably, Deen got fired from her Food Network shows.  It’s a disheartening blow to her fans.  I count myself among them.  She does some amazing things with butter, or "yellow gold" as some call it.  She truly was the Bard of Butter, the Laureate of Lard.  She displayed an artistic flair for cooking, a beautiful proficiency much like "Pistol" Pete Maravich, if basketballs were made of rendered bacon fat and hoops were made of diabetes.  She is pretty much my culinary hero.  If Mount Rushmore were made of butter, she’d be carved into it along with that hot Native American woman on the Land O’Lakes box.  

Her upcoming cookbook has been dropped by her publisher, which is a shame because it contained some of her most revolutionary recipes yet.  The book itself was rumored to be edible, with dangerously high levels of trans fats and split infinitives (recommended serving size: 2 chapters).  Its title was supposed to be Paula Deen's New Testament: 250 Favorite Recipes, All Lightened Up.  I’m not kidding, "lightened up".  Lightened up.  Though I do give her credit for not using the term “whitened up”.  Presumably it was intended to be the sequel to Paula Deen's Old Testament: Am I My Butter’s Keeper?   

Anyway I have high friends in places, and they managed to sneak me a copy of her manuscript.  Of course there are the old standbys like Butter Loaf, Country Fried Butter, Beer Battered Butter, Butters Foster, Butters Rockefeller, and Upside Down Butter Surprise.  But what's really notable is the startling boldness and creativity of some of the book's new recipes.  Take an appetizer she calls "Pretzelcoatl", for example.  That's when you take a big ole tub of butter, strip yourself and smear your entire naked body with it, grab a fistful of pretzels, and then set yourself on fire at the altar of Buttercoatl, the buttered serpent god of the ancient Olmecs (editor's note: this dish is meant to be consumed only on the eve of the harvest moon of non-Leap years, under the watchful eye of a temple-certified menstruating virgin).  Another tasty dish is the "Butterostomy".  That's when you fill a 55 gallon drum with equal parts melted butter and hog squeeze and have the contents delivered to you intravenously over the course of a week (only a week because that’s the longest the insurance company will cover your hospital stay, and even then it’s only insurable because you got your personal gastrobutterologist to claim that you were suffering from dangerously low blood butter levels).  And then there's the piece de resistance, the chef d'oeuvre, the coup de maitre, the fin du fin, the raison d'etre, the City of Light, the mouthwatering masterpiece that Paula calls "Buttered Houdini".  That's when you drain an Olympic sized swimming pool and fill it with butter, fly the Pope in to consecrate it in the name of St. Bartholomew, the patron saint of butter and angina, throw a shackled escape artist in, and then get the surviving members of the offensive line of the 2001 Super Bowl runners-up New York Giants to come and see if they can finish eating the butter before the magician can escape.  

On a more serious note, one thing I find strange in the aftermath of Deen’s firing is the cognitive dissonance being exhibited by the people coming to her defense.  Basically they're saying that every Southerner her age is racist, so why single her out?  But these are also presumably the same people who claim that racism in America is no longer a problem and get over it you libruls and I disagree with the president's policies not his skin color and some of my best friends are Marxist Kenyan Muslims and why can black people use the N-word but if I scream it at the dark-complected kid next door suddenly I'm the racist?!?!?  So anyway, which is it, geniuses?  You can't have it both ways.  Either racism is a pervasive enough problem that we have to take it seriously and try to counteract it, so let's not reflexively accuse people of playing the "race card" every time someone claims to be a victim of racism (and we can forgive Deen but use this as a teachable moment for her and others like her who are just symptoms of a pervasive racist culture) or racism is so rare that any public expression of it should be treated as a shocking violation of societal norms, so we can more or less safely scoff at any purported victim of racism since statistically you're more likely to milk a hermaphroditic unicorn than be a victim of racism (and Deen should be mercilessly lambasted for failing to conform to the same pluralistic norms that most Americans have no problem adhering to).  So, idiots, choose.  You can't have your cake and eat it too.  And if it's a chocolate cake, you can't dress it like a slave and expect it to work for beer.

Paula's Home Cooking may be off the air and Food Network may want nothing more to do with her, but her brand is still going strong in the American (clogged) Heartland.  If I'm her agent, I'm pitching potential new shows to every TV station under the sun.  If there's one thing America loves more than racism and butter, it's a comeback story.  You can't tell me there isn't a huge market for such shows as Welcome Back Butter, WKKK in Cincinnati, Deen & Deen: Butterneys at Law, Clarissa Enslaves It All, 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Butter, and my personal favorite, Manumission: Impossible.

Semper Dry: UPDATE!!!

Aww sheeeeit y'all!!!  Turns out Obama isn't the only one who was once mired in an umbrella-related scandal!  That Persian dude Xerxes way back in the BC times was caught using his top-ranking palace eunuchs, Aspamitres and Aspartame, as umbrella attendants.  This foolishly arrogant act outraged Xerxes' subjects and in short time he was assassinated by Artabanus in 465 BC.  Obama is usually quick to learn from history so I'm surprised that he wasn't smart enough to not copy Xeroxes' folly.  

L-R: Aspamitres, Aspartame, Xerxes.  Not pictured: rain.

  

Semper Dry

Damn y’all heard of this outrage about Obama having a Marine hold an umbrella over his head during an outdoors press conference with the Prime Minister of Turkey?  First of all it seems impolite to refer to an entire country as a ‘Turkey’ but then Lebron reminded me that the Ottoman Empire lost World War I so as part of its punishment it must’ve had to rename itself.  Anyway, idiotic conservatives are all like "why can’t the man hold his own damn umbrella?"  But I think these people are missing the larger point.  Don’t get me wrong, I do sympathize with those who feel that people should hold their own umbrellas.  I myself, as a 7’2” black man, have found it near impossible to find a sufficiently tall and unracist umbrella attendant.  This forces me to take care of all my umbrella-related program activities myself, but come on people, Obama is the President of the United States!  I also mow my own lawn and clip my own toenails (though rarely at the same time), but do we really expect the POTUS to do such menial tasks himself?  And why do people care so much that it’s a Marine?  The Secret Service does all the President’s laundry, reads him his bedtime stories, and packs him his Lunchables, but I don’t hear anyone complain about that.  

Just imagine if the Obamas laid off all their staff and started doing simple everyday tasks for themselves, the unemployment rate would skyrocket!  The head umbrella dude over at the Marines has a family to feed just like you or me.  He gets laid off, and his little girl can’t go to college.  Is that what you monsters want?  He went to umbrella college for 4 years just to get laid off during a recession so the White House could save a few bucks?  HAIL NO.  He served his country nobly and protected his President from the rain, and now you want to leave him out in the rain?  I DON’T THINK SNOW.  I AIN’T DOWN WET THAT.  In the olden days a man and his umbrella jockey had a special relationship, almost like bloodbrothers.  They say blood is thicker than water, but nothing is thicker than rain.  Ponder that.  Most Americans hold their own umbrellas nowadays which may seem like a good thing, but that’s a lot of former umbrella attendants out of a job.  New Jersey is the only state that has a law against self-serve umbrella use.  I don’t think it’s a coincidence that New Jersey also happens to be the most beautiful, prosperous, and happy state.  And anyway, every American President has had his own umbrella attendant ever since an un-umbrella’d William Henry Harrison caught a fatal case of the pneumonias during his Inaugural Address.  It’s an American tradition, just like baseball, apple pies, and wars in Iraq.  

Think about what happened to the last U.S. president who foolishly decided to defy proper parasol protocol.  

 

Never forget.

Even though George W. Bush presided over America’s halcyon days, and while history will surely remember him as the dignified, principled, capable leader he was, many misguided partisans stubbornly continue to define him by his sole mistake.  In case you don’t remember, in early 2005, in a rare departure from his usual practice of moderation and judiciousness, George W. Bush insisted on holding his own umbrella.  This bold demonstration of American strength was designed to strike fear into the hearts of Islamic terrorists, but it sadly ended in disaster.  The operation proved to be too ambitious, too complex, too demanding for one man to tackle, and thus had to be abandoned halfway through.  The mission left unaccomplished, an entire nation gasped in horror.  Though this was the one and only blemish on W’s legacy, a solitary turd floating along a vast tranquil pool of immaculate chlorinated glory, his reputation never really recovered. 

It's almost as though he's not that bright or something.

Umbrellagate is just proof that Obama has learned from his predecessor’s mistake, like Dubya himself who learned from Bill Clinton that one should never use an intern’s vagina as a humidor, and Clinton who in turn learned from Bush Sr. that Japanese ambassadors, contrary to certain videos you can find on the internet, do not enjoy being vomited on. 

Mission accomplished.

Nate Robinson comes out as first openly short player in NBA history

CHICAGO (AP) -- In a move sure to shock NBA fans the world over, an emotional Chicago Bulls guard Nate Robinson revealed that he is, and has been his whole life, short.  “I’m like 5’6’’, 5’7’’ tops,” Robinson tearfully admitted to a group of astonished reporters who had gathered near his locker Thursday afternoon.  “This has been eating me up inside for so long.  I knew it was time to be a man and stop living a lie.”  Asked when he first realized the truth about his condition, Robinson stated he had long suspected it but had hoped that it was “a phase [he] would grow out of.”  “I had my suspicions since I was a kid, looking at all the other kids, wondering why I was so different from them.  No one ever understood me.  Like literally, everyone stood over me because I was so much shorter than them.  Everyone looked down on me.  Like literally, they had to look down to make eye contact while talking to me, I was so much shorter than them.  At sleepovers my friends would all hang out in the pillow fort, while I’d be in the closet.  Like literally, I slept in the closet.  I was short enough to do so.”   

In an exclusive interview with Proceedings of the National Institute of Basketball, Robinson divulged more details.  In late August of last year, despondent from the stress of living a lie, a desperate Robinson attempted suicide.  “I tried to hang myself from a ceiling fan, but I couldn’t reach it,” Robinson candidly recounted.  “Then I tried to jump off a bridge, but I couldn’t clear the guardrail.  Then I stood on the El tracks hoping to get run over, but the train just whizzed by right over my head.”  The new relaxed, unburdened Robinson can see the silver lining in his suicidal predicament.  “[The train] did give me a free buzzcut, so I guess God really does have a plan for each one of us.”  Though life is often difficult, Robinson has developed ingenious ways to cope with his disability.  He shared his predicament with Chicago celebrity meteorologist Tom Skilling, who developed a state of the art device to inform Robinson of the weather.  Gushed Robinson, “I’m no longer the last to know when it’s raining, and that’s a big deal for me.”   

Robinson expressed hope that his confession would not pose a distraction as his Bulls team finds itself in the middle of a grueling playoff series against the defending champion Miami Heat.  “I know my boys in this locker room, on this team, we’re tight.  They got my back.”  “We love Nate, we know he’s so much more than just his height,” offered Bulls teammate Joakim Noah.  “He’s also his weight, speed, and jumping ability.”  Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau was supportive of his diminutive point guard.  “I think it’s great he came out.  The younger kids, this new generation, they’re a lot more open to these things.  And don’t get me wrong, I think that’s a great thing.  A great thing.”  Injured point guard Kirk Heinrich agreed.  “I don’t care if a teammate’s tall, short, white, black, green, [or] Jewish.  The only concern is ‘can he play?’  And Nate can play at times.”   

Robinson’s travails have hit home with fellow Bulls guard Jimmy Butler.  “I don’t tell people this usually, but Nate gave me the courage.  My dad was short.  Growing up, I really didn’t have any idea.  I didn’t even know what that meant.  But later my mom figured it out and they got divorced.  I didn’t have hardly any contact with him because [the divorce court judge] said that no short man could be a good father.”  Robinson’s brave admission comes at a time of increasing acceptance of short people.  “Nowadays a short person can walk down the street and no one bats an eye.  Some of my best friends are short.  Hell, my baby daughter is short, but I love her all the same,” stated Bulls forward Carlos Boozer, who signed with the Bulls two years ago after many seasons playing for the Utah Jazz.  “In Salt Lake, Nate would’ve been hassled.  They don’t take kindly to his type there.  The Mormon Church still considers shortness to be a sign of God’s disfavor.  So I’ve seen firsthand how hard it can be for people like Nate to feel welcome in society.”  Bulls small forward and native of Sudan Luol Deng, who has been hospitalized all week due to complications stemming from meningitis and a botched spinal tap, expressed pride in Robinson’s announcement.  “I come from a war torn country and almost died last week.  But when I see what Nate has been able to overcome, it makes me realize just how lucky I am.  He motivated me to play through the pain.  I knew I had to fight and represent my team.  I knew I couldn’t let Nate down.”  Bulls star Derrick Rose was unavailable for comment, as he bit his tongue five weeks ago and his personal doctor had yet to clear his mouth for speech.   

They call it the playoffs.  Perhaps it’s because, with the stakes so high, you can’t afford to take a play off.  Robinson understands this, and doesn’t shrink away from the pressure.  He has come up huge for the Bulls even while being under the microscope on this, the NBA’s biggest stage.  “The way I look at it is, you can’t spell ‘disability’ without ‘ability’”, Robinson astutely observes.  “The Chinese use the same character for ‘short’ as they do for ‘opportunity’.  It’s a blessing in disguise.  Only through adversity can we ever improve.  Yeah, so I’m short, so what?  Life is short.”  Short in stature but a giant of a competitor, Robinson is living proof that sometimes the best things do come in small packages.  Can Robinson lead his beleaguered Bulls to an upset series win against the Heat?  It would certainly be a tall order, but I for one am not about to sell him short.   

Rick Reilly contributed to this article. 

Ball is life

Aw man y’all heard about this gay dude was playing in the NBA all this time and he didn’t even tell anyone about it until just now?  That dude Jason Collins has come out of the closet.  He’s easily one of the tallest gays of all time.  And certainly he’s the best gay center in NBA history.  Seeing as how I’m the best straight center in NBA history, my fans have been hounding me to share my take on Collins’ announcement.  Of course I’m proud of Collins and impressed with his honesty and courage.  This is the most momentous event in the NBA since Oliver Miller came out as the first openly fat player (prior to Miller’s emotional 1995 press conference people had just assumed he was 2 moderately sized small forwards).   

Throughout the U.S. millions of people, even those with no previous interest in basketball, have been remarking on the significance of Collins’ revelation, and rightfully so.  Jason Collins is now a trailblazer.  Well, not a Trailblazer, he’s still a free agent although I’m sure he’d sign with Portland if they want him, but why would they with J.J. Hickson and an up-and-coming Meyers Leonard already on their roster?  But anyway, you know what I mean.  Collins has placed himself at the vanguard of the gay rights movement, a beacon of hope to extremely tall gay children everywhere.  He is now a civil rights icon, with an impact that will echo throughout history.   

I just hope that Collins’ newfound fame doesn’t overshadow the contributions of the civil rights pioneers who came before him.  People often forget that basketball, having been invented at a YMCA in Massachusetts, used to be an exclusively homosexual sport.  Teams of sweaty men wearing color-coordinated outfits consisting of sleeveless shirts and shorts as tight as saran wrap, running up and down the court whilst showing off their ball-handling skills.  It truly was a sport for men.  Men’s men, if you know what I mean (I mean homosexuals).  It wasn’t until 1956 that Jiminy Carbunkle became the first heterosexual allowed to play in the NBA.  Controversy and conflict ensued.  Teammate Fat "Sweetwater" Lipton refused to take the court alongside Carbunkle.  Carbunkle was inundated with hate mail laced with such devastating insults as “woman lover,” “breeder,” “lady toucher,” and “breast enjoyer.”  On one infamous road trip through the Midwest, fans in Fort Wayne, Indiana tormented him by throwing novelty rubber vaginas at him during the pre-game introductions.  Things got even worse in St. Louis, where a group of heterophobic pastors demanded that Carbunkle undergo aversion therapy to cure him of his heterosexual affliction.  It was only St. Louis star power forward Lavender Dempsey’s timely intervention that convinced the enraged crowd of straight-hating Baptists to let Carbunkle go safely back to his hotel room.  The press, as insatiable in its need to stir up gossip then as it is now, relentlessly hounded Carbunkle about his love life.  For his family’s protection, he had to hide the true nature of his relationship with his wife and child when they joined him on the road.  When asked, he would claim that his wife was actually his personal trainer and his 9 year old son was actually his dwarf valet.  Teammates “Jumpin” Whit Hogarth and Bruce Pepperton selflessly volunteered to convey the appearance that the trio was involved in a passionate, satisfying, and depraved polyamorous relationship to throw people off the scent of Carbunkle’s heterosexuality, but Carbunkle nobly refused to live a lie.  His career would suffer greatly for his integrity.   

In the late 1950s there was a pernicious yet regrettably widespread belief that the sweat of heterosexuals caused gay people to develop cancer.  Carbunkle was forced to play wearing a full body wetsuit lest he sweat his fellow players into an early grave.  The bulkiness of the suit severely hindered Carbunkle’s usefulness on the court and his career prematurely fizzled out.  His last appearance was Game 6 of the 1963 NBA Finals in which he played 2 minutes, amassing 0 points, 0 assists, and 2 death threats.  The next year a team of nuclear physicists at MIT demonstrated that the perspiration of heterosexual humans was harmless to gay mice.  After a decade of trials on humans, the destructive rumor was finally put to rest, much too late to help out Carbunkle. 

Moron Labe

Shit y’all heard about this tareist attack they just had over at the Boston Marathon?  Man I remember the first terrorist attack at a Marathon, that dude Darius got fucked up pretty bad that day.  This was before cell phones so Phiddipides had to run tell dat all the way back to Athens and dropped dead upon arriving cuz back then there wasn’t no Nikes.  But at least his message didn’t contain ricin, which is the new terroristical thing that’s been going around.  Maybe we should reinstate couriers to orally deliver messages in person, that way can’t no one put some poison in the letter and kill a Congressperson or some such.  Of course, the modern Phiddipides will have to be thoroughly vetted i.e. body scanned, cavity searched, irradiated, and racially profiled (in case of any brown skin related program activities).  Only then can we be sure that our nation’s Congressional correspondence is completely free from lethal toxins.  And before you say that it would be easier to just train carrier pigeons to do the same thing, keep in mind that North Korean tareists could easily just send weaponized pigeons infected with bird flu over to America (once they develop the range) and then we’d all be screwed.

So far the authorities haven’t been able to determine who’s to blame for the attack, but that sure hasn’t stopped people from making all kinds of wildly irresponsible accusations.  Of course, some liberals are saying that it’s domestic terrorists (i.e. right-wing nutjobs) who did it, and most conservatives are saying that it’s Islamic terrorists (i.e. Muslim right-wing nutjobs) who did it.  Either way, it’s almost certainly right-wing nutjobs who are responsible, and whether they play for the home team or the away team shouldn’t really matter.  Some Fox News contributor even tweeted that we should “kill all Muslims” but for all we know that could have been totally unrelated to the bombing in Boston.  It was most likely just a promo for Fox’s newest show, Kill All Muslims with Mark Levin.  I just hope the perpetrators don’t turn out to be 7 foot tall, 300 pound black men, else I’ll probably get profiled.

Alex Jones, everybody’s favorite cross between Yosemite Sam and Rush Limbaugh, claims that the attack was a false flag operation.  On the surface this seems like an unlikely, poorly reasoned, excessively paranoid, some may even say really fucking insane assertion but let’s not dismiss Jones as a delusional idiot just yet.  As I type this in solitary confinement in my meager tent at a classified FEMA internment camp, hooked up to a government-issued mind control helmet that, while uncomfortably bulky and unbearably loud as it force feeds an audiobook of Piers Morgan reading The Collected Works of Karl Marx directly into my ears, is at least mercifully protecting the open, unhealed head wounds I unrelentingly suffer at the whip of my Reptilian overseers from exposure to the acrid, stale air that permeates this desolate hellhole, I am begrudgingly reminded that Alex Jones has indeed been right in the past.  And though the lamestream media may refuse to connect the dots, certain facts do lend credence to Jones’ false flag theory.  The Vatican recently elected a new Pope; Kate Middleton is pregnant; Obama uses fluoridated toothpaste; Boston spelled backwards is “not sob”; Russian oligarchs have crippled the Cypriot banking system by overwhelming it with speculative capital; Benghazi Benghazi Benghazi Benghazi Benghazi Benghazi Benghazi; Kobe Bryant recently tore his Achilles tendon; Marathon spelled backwards is “Nohtaram” which happens to be the capital city of the Reptilians’ home planet of Alpha Rigel DQX-17.  The evidence is all out there, it’s just a matter of who’s willing to see it.   

Episode V: The Holy Roman Empire Strikes Back

Awww yeah y'all heard the news???  The Catholic Church's Papal opening has at long last been filled!  Sorry that came out a bit dirty, but I'm just so excited that Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio of Argentina was just elected the new Head Pope of the World, narrowly beating out Rick Santorum!  Bergoglio's papal name will be Pope Francis, presumably because he lost a bet with the other cardinals.  Francis is the first Pope from Latin America, which is surprising considering Latin is the official language of the Holy See.   

As Head Pope, Francis is now the Lord and Master of 1.2 billion Catholics worldwide, and with their belief that contraception is a sin, expect that number to rise exponentially.  Francis is 76, or in Vatican years, LXXVI years old.  So no one really expects him to be popin’ it up for as long as, say, Pope Pius VII who reigned from 1800 to 1823.  However long he serves for, I hope he's successful in implementing some much needed reforms.  The Catholic Church has lately been mired in controversy and scandal, with many people wondering how a supposedly holy institution could have such a large moral blind spot regarding one of the most pressing issues of our day.  Y'all know what I'm talking about.  It's a disgrace that we're here in the 21st century and the Popemobile still isn't fully electric!  Can you believe that shit?  We're in the midst of global warming on a scale heretofore unknown in recorded history, and meanwhile the Pope is blithely jaunting along in his gas guzzling monstrosity?!?  For shame.  The Popemobile is responsible for 5% of all greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.  I beseech you Pope Francis, please do something to make sure that all Popemobiles are fully electric by 2025.  Fail to act now and soon you'll be living on Vatican Island.  

And while we're on the subject of Papal reform, is it too much to ask for the Vatican to come out with a new calendar?  The one we use now was instituted under Pope Gregory XIII all the way back in 1582.  That's a long time to stick to the same one and frankly I'm pretty tired of it.  It's got way too many weekdays and not nearly enough weekends.  We can do better.  Get on that, will ya Pope Frank?  Can I call you Pope Frank? 

So anyway Pope Francis seems pretty cool and all.  His Papal motto is "Miserando atque Eligendo" which if I remember my high school Latin correctly has something to do with Jesus or God or something.  Whatever it means, it surely is more family friendly than Pope Paul VI's motto, "Cum in Ipso Monte."  Poor Monte, he must've been mortified to see the details of his private life revealed for all the world to see.  I have high hopes for Francis's Papacy, he seems progressive enough to try to shake things up a bit.  But seriously he has his work cut out for him because the Roman Catholic Church hasn’t been this unpopular since Titus Oates accused King James II of Popery… and scented candles!  Zing! 
 

With me playing center the Vatican dominated San Marino in the EIMSBA (Enclaved Italian Microstate Basketball Association)

SeQuester GOP

Aww shit y'all I'ma have to take a break from all this Papacy related program activity on account of some doings going on up in the Washington DC.  In case y'all haven't heard, them folks in Congress done passed some kind of Sea Quest or some such.  Now I don't know exactly what that means since I'm not a genius, but it doesn't take a genius to realize that now is not the time to insist on drastic across the board cuts to the gubmint's budget just so the GOP can afford go on some cruise.  

I can't have the fejrul gubmint reducing its funding at a time like this.  Being recently retired I'm more dependent than ever on government checks to survive.  Life is already hard enough without the fat NBA paychecks I'd been so accustomed to, now you expect me to live without my Social Security checks?  That's cold, President Obama.  And let me tell you, doing the halftime show of the NBA on TNT doesn't pay shit.  

I get that Uncle Sam has to pay down his debt, but I don't think that eliminating crucial government services is the way to go about doing that.  If the U.S. really is way over its salary cap, can't we just amnesty the entire South?  Jettisoning the contracts of all those underperforming Southern states would free up cap space so we could sign some better functioning democracies with plentiful natural resources like Canada or Belgium or I don't know Steph Curry is pretty good too.  At this point I'd trade Arizona for Nicaragua straight up, maybe even add a conditional 2nd round draft pick to sweeten the deal.  How about releasing Georgia the state and signing Georgia the country?  

I just hope President Obamacare reads my blog and takes my awesome budgetary advice.  The gubmint would run a lot smoother if it was run like an NBA team.  In the NBA if you're losing you can't just decide to cut back services and expect to start winning.  Back when I was with the Heat, we had one game where our point deficit vis-a-vis the Lakers was out of control.  We were down by like 20 in the 3rd quarter, with a projected 4th quarter deficit in the 40s.  We knew we owed it to our children and our children's children and also all of Shawn Kemp's children to erase the deficit so that they would not grow up in a world where the awesome Miami Heat had lost to stank ass Kobe Bryant and the pathetic Lakers.  So what did we do?  Did we beg Yao Ming to come bail us out?  Did we implement an across the board 10 percent reduction in non-essential bounce passes and alley oops?  Did we decide to go without sneakers and headbands to save a few thousand dollars?  Did we eliminate food stamps so that millions of Americans would go hungry just to save a few billion dollars?  HELL NAW!  On the contrary, Coach Stan decided to not only continue his pledge to feed me in the paint, he actually increased the rate at which I received assistance.  As you probably guessed by now, all that Dwyaneane Wade assisted stimulus helped both of us get double-doubles and of course we came back to win 124-119.  Boo-yah.

Compare that inspirational story with what the gubmint tranah do these days.  I even heard a rumor that the Post Office was thinking about not delivering mail on Saturday no more.  Sheeit.  Can you imagine the outcry if Karl Malone told the Utah Jazz he refused to deliver rim-rattling dunks on weekends?  Stern David and Jerry Sloan would have straight Sea Quested his ass to the Bobcats but they didn’t exist back then so I guess some other scrub team like the Clippers.  The point is, Mailmen, no matter if they work for the USA or the NBA, need to bring their A-game to the court 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 48 minutes a game.  Except from July to November.  They can do whatever they like then, whether it be starring in a classic kid’s movie or recording a hit rap album.