Anyone But That Guy

Hello.

So I noticed something about the blog as I was reading through the archives. I seem to have done a one eighty on Obama. Puzzled, I decided to take it up with my  unconscious self.

“Self” I said hesitantly “What’s up with that ?”

Self replies with irritation, face immersed in a coffee cup, ” Wha-?”

“That” I repeat pointing at an old post that invites Obama into the Hiawatha Forest to play hide and seek at midnight.

“What are you on about?” Self growls, plucking its face from the coffee cup. Clearly, it hasn’t been paying any amount of attention. Now that’s just annoying. You’d think that ones unconscious self would pay some sort of attention to what is going on in the outside world. Even if it is just so it can clobber you with it during REM sleep.

“This turn about on Obama? “I say pointing to recent blog posts “What gives? I thought we hated him?”

“Hate is an elusive theory.” Self replies, reaching for it’s cigarettes. I don”t smoke but apparently, Self does.

“Have you been reading Camus again?”

“Define Camus.” Self sneers through a rising cloud of smoke. I cough.

“Very funny. Seriously, what is up with this Obama thing.We really need to have a unified position. People will get confused. They’ll say I’m a waffler. And nothing is worse than being lumped in with John McCain.”

“That is more horrifying that either us needs to contemplate at this point in our relationship.”

Sigh. Obviously Self will not be giving straight answers today. Self never gives straight answers. Which is why my life is what it is. It’s like being trapped in a body with an aging, black beret wearing, macrobiotic eating, hippie. Quite horrible really. Especially when I consider how much I’ve always secretly wanted to be a a pro-life Republican. Self refuses on moral grounds. And occasionally too many coffee grounds.

I try one more time.

“Self” I yell ” I need a plausible explanation I can take to the people. Now!” I augment my position with a stern finger pointing.

Self regards me with that smug beatnik look I have always hated, yawns and says “Well, he’s not Bush.”

So now I know. I am, like many Social Democrats, willing to take anyone as the President as long as their last name doesn’t rhyme with mush, push, or shush. And their Vice President doesn’t rhyme with Heaney.

Sad really, I thought my reasoning my would be deeper and more complex, but alas, no.

Dogwoman

Education First

Hello.

Why is it when right-wing conservative types post virulent comments they spell everything wrong?

I’m not pointing fingers. God knows, I have made my share of spelling gaffes. However, there are two types of spelling errors.

1) The kind of spelling error that results from a faulty phonics logic. This usually will bring one within a short distance of the correct spelling. These are the kind I generally make.

2) The kind of spelling error that screams “Fonics really Phukked me up!” Generally made by ignoring all of the phonics rules within the English language. These are the ones I refer to in the opening sentence of this post.

If you are going to insult, demean and degrade strangers, do it with panache. Do it with style.

Do it with spell check.

An unfounded accusation really loses something when the person that is being insulted has to guess at what you are talking about by deciphering your tedious spelling.

Right is not spelled r-i-t-e.

Traitor is not spelled t-r-a-i-t-e-r.

Shite is not spelled s-h-i-i-t-e. That is some thing else entirely: pronounced Shee-ite. A form of Islam. Which might change the content of your ballsy message just a little bit.

If right wingers in small Southern states want to be taken seriously, they should really make an effort to upgrade their spelling. Use that dictionary for more than something to keep your trailer level. It seems like a nit picky thing but, an incorrectly spelled insult can really set the opposition to laughing.

So as you, a self righteous indignant right winger go out into the cruel Obama world, try to spell your Nazi protest signs, scathing blog posts,  troll comments and general words of  anger at losing the Presidential election to an articulate and charming black guy, correctly. Not Kerectly.

Dogwoman

I Do Not Think That Word Means What You Think It Means

Hello.

Dear John McCain,

I don’t want to tell you how to do your job, but you must stop using the ‘s’ word when referring to Barak Obama. The only people it’s having any impact with are those from your own party. Everyone else is laughing at you.

Are you aware that the most popular book right now was written by a man named Karl Marx? Seriously, that dry unyielding tome is flying off the shelves.

Also, being a self confessed man of the world, vastly experienced in foreign policy, you should be aware that France and Italy are both socialist countries. Italy is a mecca for social acceptance and France, aside from hating Americans on principle, has quite  a bit to recommend it.

I think you are using the word “Socialist” to mean another word that Americans fear. Communist. And the Red Scare died a few years back. So, are you attempting to call Obama a Communist without actually using the word? That’s just stupid and desperate.

In the current state of populist politics it might be best if you found another way to discredit your opponent. All you are accomplishing with your bogus ‘socialist ‘ rhetoric is jacking up Obama’s poll rankings. Which is probably not the outcome you were looking for.

I’ve got other words you might want to avoid but who has time to teach semantics to a man who hired a white trash Governor to be his running mate?

Dogwoman

Edumacation

Hello.

There is a proposal by some British nit-wittian that ‘alterantive spelling ‘ should be allowed at University level because, clearly, people can’t spell.

I am among the spelling afflicted. However, using tried and true grammar rules will usually, but not always, will get one out of a tight spelling spot.

I’ve have seen student papers at the secondary level that make me want to cry out to the Gods to stop this madness. Spelling is not the problem. The problem is grammar is no longer taught, thank you G.W.

Teachers don’t seem to care that students use phrases like ” he be, she be, then I like said”, and my personal favorite, come across in an English class  which I promptly made the student fix, “and all that shit.” It’s nice to know they can spell George Carlin’s favorite words.

Spelling requires a dictionary. When I was growing up we had eight. They each had grammar rules printed in the back. I before E except after C, unless its an ‘eh’ and in neighbor and weigh. Simple. And woe betide anyone who refused to speak proper grammar around my mother. That earned one a serious a wooden spooning. (Okay, so my mental scars were turned into a career. It works.)

The rambling point is, that if simple grammar rules were taught rather than just phonetics, as is currently the case in elementary schools, people would spell and speak concisely.

I’m sorry, but I don’t buy into the thinking that Ebonics and Text are acceptable standard public languages. They are dialects of English. Dialects shouldn’t be used in formal writing, unless it’s to make a point or highlight a character.

And students should be marked down for being so lazy that they can’t log onto their laptop and look up Dictionary.com. It’s not like they have to hike to the nearest library anymore. Point and click ye morons.

Dogwoman

Three in One

Hello.

Dear Vice President Dick Cheney,

Thank you for your kind words about the soldiers serving in Iraq on the news that we have now lost 4,000 men and women. You are absolutely right, they did volunteer. So did you. And the only action you’ve seen so far is shooting your friend in the face while hunting maimed birds. Perhaps a three year tour of that sandy hell hole would give your tired old ass a wake up call. Just a thought.

Love,

Dogwoman

Dear President Bush,

Please stop talking. Every time you open your mouth something incomprehensible and slightly scary comes out. We the People of the United States would like you to convert to Buddhism and take a vow of silence for the next 10 months.

Sincerely,

Dogwoman

Dear Pat Buchanan ,

Black people across America would like to thank you for really getting to the root of the civil rights movement. With comments like your recent ones stating how grateful they should be that White landowners rounded them up like cattle and shipped them across the ocean like abused sardines, I’m sure there won’t be any backlash.

Are you stuck in a time warp, you cretin?

Honestly, why do these things just creep out of your mouth ? African- Americans are not the only group of people on welfare, using Pell grants or benefiting from state run programs to help the poor. Like Ice Pops, poor people come in all flavors and none of them are grateful to be poor. In fact, they are a bit pissed off. And waiting outside your fancy office. With torches and pitch forks.

Gee, I wonder what they want?

Regards,

Dogwoman

Book ‘Em Danno

Hello.

There’s a boycott going on, didn’t you know?

Muslim States are boycotting the Paris Book Fair because the guest of honor is Israel.

It’s a book fair. A collection or gathering of writers and publishers. Not a G8 convention. It’s asinine to boycott books because the GOH is a hotbed of political controversy. I’m thinking that if the flyleaf were on the other cover this wouldn’t be an issue. It’s another attempt to politicize an event to make a point. Okay, point made. Move on.

What a terrible thing to happen to writers from countries like Morocco, Iran, Lebanon. Here in America, we don’t get a lot of exposure to World Lit, even if we take the class in college. World Lit class gives us books like Things Fall Apart and Night. Both very good books but, surely we could use some of the North African writers or Norwegian writers or Arab writers. But no. If I want a book by a non American writer I have to sign into Amazon with a fake accent. Most current American ‘Literature’ is crap. To my way of thinking James Patterson is not a writer, he’s a man with a formula and a business plan. I went walking through a bookstore recently and found that seventeen books in the A-L section had the word Daughter in the title. American writers have become so crap they can’t even think of their own titles anymore. We need World Lit writers. Desperately. Please.

My point is, Book Fairs, be they in Paris, London, Turin or elsewhere are there to bring new writers and old writers into a place where literature can be examined openly and not sotto voce in a tiny tea room or remote artists’ loft. Boycotting only hurts the writers. And if a country wants to gain a political foothold, they should stop gagging the very people who can make that happen for them. To issue a boycott for political reasons in a realm where exceptional lying is a way of life just seems a bit oxymoronish. While writers can write about political issues, politics, historically, has never been allowed to decide the moment for writers. Well, except the Salman Rushdie thing, but that’s over so, why dwell?

I’m thinking that the political movers and shakers in this day of bland unexciting news reporting have forgotten a very important point. Writing is an art form. It’s art.

And it takes a small mind to tell an artist that they can’t show their work because they don’t like what the artists from another country have to say.

Dogwoman

Wordy Goodness

Hello.

I am not always about the rants. Sometimes I find something good on the internet. Like today, I found a site everyone should visit.

It’s called Free Rice. It’s a vocabulary word builder that donates 20 grains of rice to the U.N. for distribution in starving nations for every word you correctly identify. So that’s cool. You have fun and the world gets a little brighter. Find the link below and get playing.

FreeRice

Dogwoman

Top Tubes

Hello.

So, have you ever been tooling around the net only to find something so horrifying you must stop and examine it from all angles? Today I found just the thing. It’s called, and please I am not making this up, GodTube.

That’s right folks, now for all of you who feel there aren’t enough religion inspired videos on YouTube, there’s finally a place for you. I was particularly entranced with their tagline “Broadcast Him”. Note the capital H. Otherwise, it could be ‘him’ anybody. With the capital it let’s the world know it’s the BIG HIM, not just anyone. And does HIM want to be broadcast? That’s something we’ll have to wait to find out.

The video’s include, sermons, Christian music videos, and a Fox News interview. ‘Cause when I think HIM, I think Fox news. No, really, everyone knows that all of their information comes, not from journalistic integrity, but from on High. By which I mean the White House press secretaries.

This is what their CEO had to say about why they started GodTube:

“Most Christians want to reach un-churched people,” Smith said, “but you have to be really smart about where you reach un-churched people at.”

Un-churched? He makes it sound like if you don’t go to church you have a disease. “Don’t go near them Susie, they’re Unchurched .” At which point the wailing begins and Christians flee to begin preparing for Armageddon. Unchurched, I’ll just put that on my list of words that need never be used again, like the word scrummy.

I am amused when things like this pop up. Christian Fundamentalists harp on and on about secular society and it’s evil ways but they seem to have no problem taking the most popular things from that society and giving them a religious bent. They think they are creating something new but in fact, they are not. The Fundamentalists haven’t had anything new in sometime. Like country music, they just steal a good idea and put their own twist on it. I thought stealing was against the Law?

I should mention at this point that, apparently, there is a JewTube and an IslamicTube as well. As of yet we have not seen a BuddistTube or a JainistTube but, we’re waiting.

I was going to create my own site called ApathyTube but, really, I couldn’t be arsed.

Dogwoman

Say What?

Hello.

Today’s big long post is about magical realism vs. post modernism in new millennium film.

Just kidding.

Actually, it’s about how people use too many words to say nothing at all. I just finished reading a two page interview and when I finished, I had to go back and read it three more times. It occurred to me after I still didn’t understand what the hell was going on that, albeit, I may not be as smart as I’d like to think, I should have at least gotten a gist. Just a gist. But no. Then I realized that’s because the interviewee didn’t answer any of the interviewers questions. Not a one. And you’d think Obama would be just a little more articulate.

Now I understand why they call it spin. When you are finished listening to this garbage, you’re dizzy. And confused. And a bit pissed off.

Why does everything have to sound like a Fox newscast? Just because you have a dictionary, doesn’t mean you need to abuse it this way.

It not just political figures either. I eavesdrop all the time. And what I hear makes my internal English teacher cringe. The long winded explanations about why girl number one didn’t make it to girl number two’s party. Hey chickee, say it with flowers, would you. Because the verbal assault that is coming out of your mouth makes me want to tap dance on you. Ok, maybe not, but I usually have to move to some place quiet and rock back and forth for several minutes.

Shakespeare said that “Brevity is the soul of wit.” He should have said “Verbosity is the soul of twit”

Life is not MySpace. Stop treating every conversation like a social networking page. This means you, Hilary, Mitt, and Rudy. But most especially you Fred! Honestly, what the heck was that tirade all about anyway? Absolutely nothing, that’s what.

Sometimes, wait no, most of the time, the less countable words coming out of the mouth is better. Use precision and you won’t have to keep explaining yourself.

And OMG, textspeak is not language, it’s language reduced to the lowest common denominator.

I feel better.

Dogwoman