Scott McClellan on the Daily Show

Whats really interesting watching McClellan on this is how he really seems to ignore the way that the people in the White House were willingly lying to the public. I mean, certainly he gives the impression of almost completely lacking the ability for self-reflection. I mean, he certainly seems to be trying to say, against the evidence of his own book, that the people involved weren’t lying except that they ended up lying. Which is a really weird position. It seems like, from his point of view, he is trying to show how others lied, but in order to avoid the realisation that he was one of those liars he tries to suggest that the lying wasn’t deliberate?
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Wrestling Gone Wrong & Act-I-Vate

Two great websites that I’ve neglected to put onto my blogroll so far - Wrestling Gone Wrong is pretty self-explanatory one would think, while Act-I-Vate is a ‘webcomics collective’ featuring some truly great talents. While I haven’t had a chance to go through all the content they have, I would happily recommend ‘Kelly’ by Dan Goldman, though be warned that it is a truly fucked-up piece of work and ‘Lily McKenzie’ by Simon Fraser

Fucking Censorship

For a large variety of reasons, both personal and practical I hate whenever I see censorship in pretty much any form. Given my own inclinations towards liberalism and what would be called ‘political libertarianism’, and more generally for the practical reason that, in my experience, whenever there is censorship of items, it generally tends to be becuase the people calling for the censorship don’t ‘get’ the item in question I tend to assume that censorship is often a knee-jerk reaction to the unknown or frightening rather than something that’s neccessary.

Two recent news items that I have seen in the last 24 hours have left me feeling rather angry and raging against the stupidity of the so-called ‘moral majority’. The first one is reported here where Joe Duffy (Ireland’s resident fuckwit Jerry Springer) gets himself in a tizzy over the fact that Batman comics aren’t always suitable for children while the second one is about a British law that makes it illegal to view certain kinds of pornography, even if the pornography itself is not illegal.

With regards to the Batman issue in question (its one of the ‘All Star Batman and Robin issues which I’ve talked about before), I find that I can agree to a small extent with the mother who called in, because the issue in question, and the all-star Batman series in general is not suitable for children and Titan books, the comics publisher who is reprinting this material for the UK market should look at the content of the issues more before deciding to advertise the books to children. However, what got me rather annoyed, was the assertion by the guest from the rape crisis centre who blatanly asserted that people like me, who have been reading comics for years, and have been exposed to comics like ‘All-Star Batman’ are dysfunctional rapists waiting to happen. Now obviously, outside factors do play into rapists, and violent or abusive individuals will always find certain materials more stimulating. But, to suggest that because the Joker (in this case) date-raped a woman and kills her after showing misogyny in general, that I, or any other reader of comics, will do so is absurd. And yet, after Joe Duffy talking about this on his show and not finding anybody intelligent from the comics community to defend the books (the guys who were on his show defending comics, to put it mildly, didn’t do a good job), the impression that people have of the books will not exactly be the best. As a friend of mine put it on Gmail Chat today, and I’m quoting here:

yeah, but know in kitchens all across ireland, idiots who actually listen to duffy and value his opinion uncontrollable laughter are thinking that all those who read comic book readers are rapists

Now, this is probably going to go nowhere (I hope) but given the growing interest in Manga and French comics (but Manga especially) here in the English-speaking world,how long will it be before we see some ‘parents group’ jumping on this bandwagon?

But, what can one expect when in the Uk, the government has made it illegal to look at porn of a certain kind, even if that porn is not illegal? It’s that kind of ridiculous double-speak laws that make one fearful of the idea that we are moving to a society where these sort of knee-jerk ‘concerned citizens’ control us all. Whats most insidious about that law is that its going to make people who are perfectly decent individuals criminals in the eyes of the world simply because theire sexual interests diverge from the mainstream. The intellectual coherence of the arguement against ‘extreme pornography’ has all of the mental coherence of the homosexuals = future pedophiles or ‘Goths = future Columbine case’ arguements one hears every so often. Whats also interesting is how around 10 minutes in, the person being interviewed points out that the illegality of these images means that possession of these materials mean that people could be open to ‘legal revenge’ after a break-up in a relationship. Furthermore, they point out that the language used, comparing these people to peadophiles or murderers is grossly over the top. Anyway, have a look or listen to both of the links I provided.

Stephen Colbert at the White House dinner

I remember this video as being one of the first times I was ever exposed to politics in a meaningful sense. While its probably an odd thing to say, this was one of the first times that politics became ‘real’ for me and remains one of the best ‘take-downs’ of the Bush Administration I have seen. What’s impressive (and kind of horrifying) is that a large number of the comments made by Colbert still apply…

‘Grindhouse’ - possibly the best cinema experience?

As I’ve already talked about a bit, I went to see ‘Grindhouse’ last night. Now I know the film didn’t do brilliantly as a double feature, but the only thing that proves is that people are fucking idiots. I cannot remember the last time I was at a movie where the audience burst into applause at various points during the films. Now personally I can’t recommend both films enough, though ‘Planet Terror’ is clearly the better of the two and you really need to watch the whole thing as the single film experience, and preferably in the cinema to get the full value of it. There are a few things that I should mention though:

Battle Pope! Not the Real Pope! Battle Pope!

While this cartoon isn’t quite as funny as the comic, mainly because it’s been toned down a bit, it’s still good for a chuckle:

Cock Load - Cock Load - Battle Pope - In the Beginning

Cock Load - Cock Load - Battle Pope - Genesis of an Ass-Kicking Read the rest of this entry »

The ‘Grindhouse’ Fake Movie Trailers

Grindhouse plays in Cork in a week and a half - who’s interested in going to see it? The fake trailers are just class, I really hope the plans to make some into ‘real’ films happens. Especially ‘Werewolf Women of the SS’ - what a title!

Fox News attempts to re-write history of George W., Daily Show looks at Fox instead…

Gotta love taking the piss out of Fox ‘News’:

Part two after the jump Read the rest of this entry »

Democrat says atheists have no rights in America

This story is unbelievable, here’s part of a transcript of the exchange where Democrat Monique Davis attacked activist Rob Sherman after he dared question a million dollar donation from the state to a Baptist Church:

Davis: I don’t know what you have against God, but some of us don’t have much against him. We look forward to him and his blessings. And it’s really a tragedy — it’s tragic — when a person who is engaged in anything related to God, they want to fight. They want to fight prayer in school.

I don’t see you (Sherman) fighting guns in school. You know?

I’m trying to understand the philosophy that you want to spread in the state of Illinois. This is the Land of Lincoln. This is the Land of Lincoln where people believe in God, where people believe in protecting their children.… What you have to spew and spread is extremely dangerous, it’s dangerous–

Sherman: What’s dangerous, ma’am?

Davis: It’s dangerous to the progression of this state. And it’s dangerous for our children to even know that your philosophy exists! Now you will go to court to fight kids to have the opportunity to be quiet for a minute. But damn if you’ll go to [court] to fight for them to keep guns out of their hands. I am fed up! Get out of that seat!

Sherman: Thank you for sharing your perspective with me, and I’m sure that if this matter does go to court—

Davis: You have no right to be here! We believe in something. You believe in destroying! You believe in destroying what this state was built upon.

As is pointed out in the article, imagine if that Democrat had said the same thing to a Muslim or Mormon or even a Scientologist. They’d be hounded out of their seat like there was no tomorrow. Anyway, I suspect I’ll be keeping my Atheist beliefs secret when I go to the states for the summer. If not, hell with responses like that I’ll probably be lynched by somebody….

So d’ya know the way that the U.S., Canada and Mexico are actually the one country and are run by the overlords?

I love paranoia: