Post-Friday Beast Blogging: The National Security Edition

RILEY:  We must maintain a constant state of high alert!  Ready to respond instantly to real or perceived threats!

MOONDOGGIE:  Wha--?  What threats?

RILEY:  Oh, they're out there -- lurking.  Threats to our very way of life...Store brand cat food!  Humans hogging the couch!  The vacuum cleaner!

MOONDOGGIE:  Okay...I'll sleep with one eye half-open...

RILEY:  (Sigh)  You see what I have to work with?

MOONDOGGIE:  ZZZzzzzzzzzzzzz....

Happy Birthday Bill S! and The Minx!

UPDATE: Sooo...it seems that I misread my calendar, and Bill and The Minx's birthday is actually tomorrow, the 15th. Usually I only screw up Doghouse's natal date, but apparently for 2013 I'll be exploring bold new frontiers in carelessness and incompetence; and since we haven't had an Internet connection all day, I'm not even sure I can fix this using my phone. On the bright side, if it turns out I can't publish corrections, I'll just pretend it's deliberate and apply for a job at the Daily Caller.

Anyway, someone please put the cake back in the fridge while I try to tape this piñata back together. (And if you haven't checked out Keith's piece on The Soda Civil War, please drop by the post below and join our illuminating discussion of constitutional liberties, knee socks, and that guy who played Baron Samedi in LIVE AND LET DIE.)
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Really swamped today, but I had to take a moment and wish a festive Natal Day to friend and valued World O' Crap contributor Bill S. (known each year on this day, in a legal and binding fashion, as Bill S!), and to friend, fellow cat fancier, and treasured member of the Wo'C community, The Minx.

This year, Bill requested two separate slabs of hairy, brawny, glistening cheesecake, and since I'm not terribly familiar with either gentleman, I figure I'd let him fill in their vital statistics.  First up:

Matt Bomer

"Matt Bomer might be the prettiest man on basic cable, although he was derided as not being heterosexual enough to play the lead in the film version of "50 Shades of Grey" -- by a writer who's apparently not heterosexual enough to write the screenplay.  (Or maybe the producers decided to go with someone better at writing than Brett Easton Ellis -- they wouldn't have to look further than the nearest 10th grade creative writing class.)"

Scott Caan

"And, because I'm a shorty, Scott Caan, as a reminder that good things come in small packages -- at 5'5", he's Hollywood's Hunkiest Homunculus -- and still towers over me."

Enjoy, Bill.  For the Minx, we present one of our favorite cheesecake photos from one of our favorite artistes of the Golden Age of Hollywood -- the often daring and always delightful Joan Blondell.

Please join me in wishing them both (Bill and The Minx, that is, not Joan's, um...never mind) a very Happy Birthday.

Soda Jerk

By Keith, World O' Crap's Senior Big Gulp Correspondent:

From Michael M. Grynbaum of the NYT (March 11, 2013):

A judge invalidated New York City's limits on large sugary drinks on Monday, one day before they were to go into effect, dealing a significant blow to one of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's signature public health initiatives and a marquee project of his third term.

The decision by Justice Milton A. Tingling Jr. of State Supreme Court in Manhattan blocks the city from putting the rules into effect or enforcing them.

Justice Tingling said the rule banning the drinks was "arbitrary and capricious."

Justice is -- apparently -- still available in some circumstances. It arrived promptly at 5 o'clock pm. EDT. Who better to deliver the take-down than the Hon. Justice Tingling Jr. After all, such a welcome contradiction to the edicts of "the Bloomberg" is tingling in its own fashion.

(Let's all send the Hon. Tingling a lovely Hallmark holiday card at year's end.)

And let's all celebrate with a 24-oz. Mountain Dew, Pepsi, RC or whatever.

Truthfully, this correspondent gave up soda-pop after the "New Coke" fiasco, which we believe was concocted to bring the "Old" Coca-Cola back with high-fructose corn syrup substituted for the real highly-refined sugar from back when. Once I craved Coca-Cola but gave it up after the "fix" was in. Pepsi was no comfort ... seltzer with lime became the favorite carbonated beverage chez Keith (always better with a shot of angostura).

So, whether you are "tea party," "coffee party," or "partay-partay" let us give thanks that the man formerly known as a brilliant engineer and media mogul has been defeated, temporarily, in his enduring quest to make us all healthier. Healthier to pay more parking fines and other nuisances.

Some lovely vintage soda-pop advertising from days of yore:

 "Sip and Zip."  Now with Judge Tingling Zing!

"Refreshes without filling."  The first word in empty calories.

"Your throat feels cool, your mouth feels fresh."  Real thirst-quencher!  Real wrist-squisher!  (Watch the bowling ball there, Butch Wax.)

Dolores Haze for Nehi!

 "Your parents were hypocrites.  Our parents were Beatniks!"

Post-Friday Beast Blogging: The Bad Blogger Edition

RILEY:  What the hell kind of a blog is this, anyway?  Do you have any idea how infrequently you post cat pictures?  You suck as a blogger!

MOONDOGGIE:  Oh now, that's a little harsh...

RILEY:  Don't interrupt!  You made me forget what I was going to say...Oh.  Right...

RILEY:  You suuuuuuuck.

Chrome Dome Alert! Big Bolshevik Bean on La Brea!

Sorry, still wrestling with this project, but I feel like I need to wrap it up and get back to blogging ASAP -- not only because I can't miss any more deadlines and expect the producers won't at least take the pinkie from my left hand, but also because I get the feeling that the life is passing me by as I beaver away here in my little room.  For instance, there's now a giant chrome-plated Lenin head down the street from us:

It's on La Brea Avenue, across from the defunct Chrysler dealership where we bought our car back in 2007, and stands in a weird crotch-like notch outside a failed Pontiac dealership that's now the Ace Museum.

Naturally, at first I thought the post-Apocalyptic End Times were upon us, and this was simply a flashier version of the Giant Screaming Santa Head from Zardoz.

But the Giant Lenin Head doesn't seem as angry as Zardoz, can't fly, and hasn't been heard to tell passersby that "the penis is evil" (although here in Hollywood that's taken for granted, and would be akin to remarking that hey, the sun is shining).  Of even greater significance is the fact that while the Giant Screaming Santa Head constantly flits about the Midlands, disparaging the male organ of generation and vomiting rifles (which seems like a mixed message and makes one suspect Zardoz may be compensating for something -- I mean, besides the fact that he doesn't have a body, because even when he did I bet he had a Small Screaming Santa Penis), the Giant Lenin Head seems content to simply spend the day hosting a circus on his scalp.

When I first saw this, I felt instantly compelled to pull over and snap some photos, figuring that any casual mention of a Giant Chrome Lenin Head Infested With Flying Wallendas would be greeted with the age-old Twitter challenge, "Pix or it didn't happen."  And thanks to the crappy zoom feature on my camera phone, I was able to determine the identity of the aerialist.  It was not, as I first suspected, a head louse who was jealous of the flea circus and joined Cirque du Soleil.  No, it's actually....

Jim Henson's Tightrope-Walking Naked Mao Tse Tung Babies (Now With Moobs)!

Naturally, this called for further study, and a quick trip to the Google reveals the installation is entitled "Miss Mao Trying to Poise Herself at the Top of Lenin’s Head" -- no potential lawsuit for false advertising there -- and was sculpted by two Chinese brothers, Gao Zhen and Gao Qiang.  Below is a picture of the artists posed beside their creation, just to give a sense of scale:

I still don't know what it means, but on the bright side, it's no longer necessary to travel to all the way to Lenin's Tomb in Red Square in order to get a good look up the Bolshevik leader's nostrils.

Anyway, I guess the lesson here is, All Glory is Fleeting, and the Penis is Evil, but the Head is Shiny.

S.Z. Sundays: The Once And Future Gays

With California's Proposition 8 up for debate at the Supreme Court, it seems like a good time to revisit this post from February 28, 2004, when President George W. Bush announced his support for the Federal Marriage Amendment, which would settle the issue once and for all by making gays unconstitutional.  Take it away, Sheri...

We Need a Federal "No More Inbreeding" Amendment

Say what you will about the FMA's chances of ever getting passed, you do have to admit that President Bush's endorsement of it have caused the wingnuts to really show their nuttier side. 

 

A couple of quick examples:

1.  Here's Jerry Falwell with  A Call to Scotchguard Marriage :

If this simple but powerful amendment becomes law, it would permanently protect traditional marriage from activist judges and politically correct activists from ever achieving their goal of attaining homosexual marriage rights. The traditions of our Founders would be secured.

Yes, their traditions like wooden teeth, outhouses, and slavery would be secured forever and ever.

Christians must be prepared to fearlessly (and immediately!) invade the culture with the Gospel of Christ to counter the godless effort to bring radical social change to our nation. This effort has no end because these social extremists will never be satisfied; if they achieve homosexual marriage there is literally no telling what they will want next 

There is indeed literally no telling what they will want next, because those close-mouthed godless radical gay social extremists just aren't saying.  But we can guess: they'll probably want homosexual wedding showers and gay divorce.  Oh, and to eat Christian babies.

The issue goes far deeper than homosexual marriage, though. Homosexual-rights advocates are on a relentless quest to gain governmental and social endorsement of their lifestyle(s). And our children are their targets!

See, I told you they wanted to eat our children!  And you'll notice that some of them are so depraved that they have more than one lifestyle.  Be careful: some of these bi-lifestylers might be in YOUR neighborhood.   Be especially wary of the evangalist/hateful bigot.  They can be nasty when cornered. 

 2.  And now let's let Armstrong Williams order around the VP's daughter in Dance, Mary, Dance:

One moment gay and lesbian protesters are demanding that we regard them not by their insipid sexual acts, but as complex human beings deserving of the same inalienable rights the constitution reserves for all "humans."  The next moment they are labeling and dismissing any human who breaks ranks with their cause. 

Damn gays!  They want us to treat them like humans, and then they go and set up a website asking "the openly gay daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney" to support their cause.  And this means that we DON'T have to treat them like humans.

Oh, and Armstrong wants you to know that his sexual acts are bold and flavorful.

Get it? Mary doesn't act as gay as they feel she should so they label and dismiss her. How neat and easy and ridiculously absurd. I mean, isn't this precisely the sort of reductive stereotyping that the homosexual activists are supposed to be fighting against? I mean, isn't that their thing? Respecting a human beings freedom to make intimate decisions without heaps of third-party indignation and scorn? 

Yeah, they're supposed to respect people and stuff, and yet they treat Mary like a homosexual!  The hypocrites!  Thank heavens that we never claimed to respect anybody, and so can bash people without compunction.

After all, why do gay couples want the church's blessing? They could go about their business just fine without having been "wed" in a church, right?  Unless there is more to it.  It is political, and often economic. 

Whoa, Armstrong has figured out those inscrutable gays!  It seems that they aren't trying to force Catholic priests to marry them after all!  No, they want the economic and legal benefits that come with civil marriage.  The sneaks!

But if you look behind the rhetoric about civil rights, it becomes clear that they are acting at the expense of what is best for society, and to grant them victory, would be to rip our most sacred religious and cultural ideals to shreds. This no one owes them! 

Why do gays hate America and its most sacred religious and cultural ideals?

Post-Friday Beast Blogging: "The Candid Cam--Oh Crap" Edition

ME:  Ahhh, they look so cute snuggling together...

ME:  I'll just sneak up with the camera and they'll never know--

ME:  (BACKING AWAY SLOWLY)