Bussing for Tips

Recently, the media, particularly cable news (including FOX) have featured stories about greedy entrepenuers in New Orleans who have started bus tours of the flood ravaged areas of the Big Easy. These stories have mostly taken the tone that this is horrendous exploitation of the poor victims of this natural disaster. They spice this story up with pictures of these minibusses traversing the flotsam of storm-ravaged neighborhoods with occasional cuts to the actual flood itself (avec bodies if possible). I find such criticism to be blatantly hypocritical … since these same cable channels have been doing the electronic equivalent of these bus tours for the last three months … and for the big advertising bucks, not just tickets and tips.

Quotable Quotes

Glad to be back!!! (See how long this lasts.)

DEN says: [Bush's] attitude seems to be that our brave soldiers support the mission so you citizens back home do not have the right to question it.

Clooney says: Another national politician saying that we are losing the war in Iraq and can't possibly win it ... is not questioning it ... it is traitorous defeatism pure and simple.

My favorite quote regarding this issue is from A. Lincoln:

"The Constitution is not a suicide pact."

Signed: A Raving Nationalistic Nazi

Oops

I have been plagued by computer malfunctions lately. I am relegated to a dial-up connection which is both agonizing and hideous.

In a misguided effort to update my last entry, I deleted Clooney as a contibutor along with his latest post. I plan to rectify this situation. Clooney fans (both of you) stay tuned and things will be set aright.

DFM Manager

Leadership and Common Sense

I subscribe to the definition if leadership as “Getting others to want what you want” - as opposed to merely getting them to do what you want. Most managers never really learn this important distinction between being a manager and being a leader.
In his speeches lately George W is characterizing actions that are being questioned as "Leading." He believes that his role as President means that he has a duty to do what he thinks is right. I might agree with him if what he thinks is right is upholding the Constitution. He is not an Emperor. I do not think that he had shown enough leadership, frankly. His attitude seems to be that our brave soldiers support the mission so you citizens back home do not have the right to question it.


I really do want to believe that the war in Iraq was necessary. And, I do believe that the US needs to exert power to defend allies and interests. But, I have to say that I do not feel safe with Bush in charge. He is not able to coordinate a coalition of nations like a real Leader. So, the USA looks like “cowboys” to the world. The most disturbing thing is that his staunchest supporters are mostly raving nationalistic nazis who do not care what the rest of the world thinks. (Too bad we have not been offered a better choice for the job of President of the US).

On the other hand, I do support what I see as "reasonable" the search methods of surveillance that have raised such a furor of late. It just seems like common sense to secretly tap the phones of people who are legitimately suspected of dealing with terrorists. To be sure, this can become a bit slippery - as when the anti-war meetings of Quaker grandmothers are given the same scrutiny as secret meetings between suspected Jihadists. Still, there is no evidence that the recent surveillance flap affected anyone who did not deserve it.


It seems to me that the Constitution aims to protect the right of Citizens to raise their voices in protest to government policies, but does not seek to protect those who would advance their cause through violence. Despite the interpretations of some, The right to revolt is not guaranteed.

Those who oppose any form of surveillance often use the quote attributed to Ben Franklin "Those who would sacrifice a little freedom to gain a little safety deserve neither the safety or the freedom."

How this quote passes for wisdom is beyond me. It makes no logical sense. Of course we are all willing to sacrifice a little freedom for safety. This is why we allow ourselves to be taxed, policed and regulated. If Ben Franklin really said that he should be fired. Who is he to decide what measure of anything people deserve anyway?

Another bogus quote that has always mystified me - MLK said: "If a man can't find a cause that he is willing to die for, then he isn't fit to live." Really? Let's see, I am not fit to live because I don't want to die? Hmmn. Let me get back to you on that one....

War and Peace

War and Peace

I’ve suspected for a long time that there is a simple solution for winning wars -- you must out-brutalize your opponent(s). By “out-brutalize” I mean you pursue your enemy with absolute and unstopping ruthlessness. This does not mean that you exact sinister or sadistic revenges but rather measured punishments that go beyond your enemy’s actions by a degree sufficient to discourage their further agression.

If they buzz bomb London for months on end, you, once you achieve air superiority, fire bomb their industrial and population centers every night for the remainder of the war … killing and destroying with moral justification. If they invade your country for the second time by sending an army of elephants and legions of mercenaries against your capital, you respond by burning down their capital, killing as many of their citizens as possible … and salting their fields (Carthega delenda est). If they send suicide pilots in planes stuffed with high explosives to crash against your navy closing in on their mainland, you unleash the terrible terror of atomic weaponry against them. If they cut the heads off your countrymen and allies who have been taken prisoner, you pass laws that say your interregators of these same enemy prisoners must treat them with respect and honor. If they fly airplanes into your skyscrapers killing 3,000 innocents, you seek to have them tried in criminal courts by a jury of their peers. (Obviously, the last two examples are meant to illistrate the absurdity of our country’s actions.)

Combatants must be careful in crafting such responses to terrorists so they are not understated or overstated. For instance, when Germany lined up everyone in a Polish village and shot them in retaliation to the killing of a German soldier by a sniper, that was an overstatement. When Israel responded to Hamas’s suicide bombers by razing their familys’ homes, this was an understatment. (I think it just served to piss off terrorists, not scare the piss out of them.) But, when Israel changed tactics to that of sending missles into the cars of Hamas leaders, these suicide bombings dropped off significantly. I happen to believe that another appropriate response to suicide bombers who kill many innocents would be to execute their immediate families (assuming that they were the support group that caused such atrocities to happen.) I think that this would be appropriately measured brutality.

My point is -- I think we really need to rethink how we are responding to the Iraqi and other Islamo-facist terrorist acts … and be more brutal, not less.

POSTED BY CLOONEY

Just Thinking...

In the Paper today (Globe 11-28-5) there is a story about a guy who has a mission to visit every Starbucks in the world. Some might regard this as an ambitious quest to do something no one has done before. Some might see it as a foolish waste of time - when there are so many starving children in the world. If you are from New York you cycnically suspect that the guy is secretly on the Starbuck's stealth marketing payroll.

To me, the guy is just a blogwhore, trying to get attention so he can cash-in on the ads everytime you click on his blog, which is littered with little marketing links and absolutely no substance.
Perhaps this is the evolution of the internet - to allow the fiends in marketing to bombard us with promotional messages everywhere we go.

Undoubtedly, the publicity afforded to this wanker will spawn a plethora of me-too "quests."
Geraldo visits every homeless veteran shelter in the US, A Quincy, Mass housewife who decides to visit every toe-fungus clinic in North America, ....that sort of thing.

===
How can you be "Pro-life" and opposed to welfare?
When you do not see the irony of these competing issues, then you are truly a Conservative.

====
Wayne Dyer:
When you change the way you look at things,
the things you are looking at change too.

Reprise of one of my favorites

Over The River & Across The Tracks

It was a chilly afternoon, as we headed to Granny Gert's house for the annual Thanksgiving Feast. We were bundled-up because Pap made Uncle Gelbert drive the old Pink and White Nash Rambler wagon while he sat in the shotgun seat with the window open. Pap was pretty hung-over and he kept ralphing out the window. We - Maw, Throck, and me sat in back. We were used to Pap's hangovers and the lingering smell of his vomit oneverything.

We were, of course, late. We were late for everything, except the time me and Throck were born back in Montana on the way to the hospital. That was the one time we were early for anything. Still, Maw always said we could've made it to the hospital except Pap was at the roadhouse when the first contractions came and she had to wait two hours before him to get home to take her to the hospital.

When we arrived at Granny Gert's trailer, we piled out of the car. Granny's dogs greeted us in the usual fashion - barking raucously,jumping up and down, and looking for a leg to hump. "Git back youlot!" She shouted coming down the steps waving a cattle prod. Me andThrock looked at each other wondering if she meant us or the dogs. The dogs thought it was them and they instantly fell into a tongue hanging heap near the trailer steps. Then she went over to where Pap and uncle Gelbert were standing. "Georgie! Gelbert! You two boys!" They eyed her suspiciously. "Give us a hug." She bellowed. They complied meekly. "I see you haven't changed your naughty ways, Georgie." she said to Pap, nodding to the flecks of puke dripping fromthe side and rear panel of the Rambler. He shrugged. We all went inside to warm up.

Maw had brought a package of frozen peas and another of frozen squash. Pap produced a 5th of Gallo Creme Sherry from a brown bag and waved itover his head like it was the US open winners trophy. We all applaudedapprovingly, except Gramps who hadn't even noticed us arrive. He sat in a ratty old chair facing the TV watching the football game on a small black and white screen. Granny, who was returning from the cupboard with a tray of jelly glasses, nodded towards Gramps with her head, "Somebody go and shake him. His hearing aid batteries went dead last month and he hasn't been much for conversation lately."

Pap went over and stood infront of him. "Hi dad," he grinned toothlessly. The old man looked at him, seeming not to recognize him for a moment. Then he broke into a big smile. "Georgie, hey, sit down. Watch the game. Did you bring anything to drink?"

Dinner was predictable. Granny heated a frozen turkey loaf in the microwave and poured a can of beef gravy over it. She had mixed-up a batch of instant whipped potatoes, and had fried the green peas in apan. Each little pea had a burn mark, which she instantly renamed 'black-eyed green peas". She proudly announced that she had bought new plastic utensils for the occasion and Chinette plates and cups. Even though we were 20 years old, me and Throckmorton had to take our plates to a card table in the living room while "the adults" - Granny, Gramps, Gelbert, Pap and Maw crowded around the breakfast nook. There was a hair in my gravy. But I wasn't hungry anyway. Halfway through the meal Granny remembered the Squash, which was thawing on the counter. "Save your plates everybody, we can have this for desert. And don't nobody throw away them new plastic cutlery!"
After all the remnants of the meal had been cleared and piled in thesink, we sat watching the end of the football game, cleaning our teeth with individually wrapped toothpicks, like the ones you get at the chinese restaurant.

It had gotten dark, so Granny turned on a few more lamps. We heard a truck pull-up outside. Young Billy came through thedoor, red-faced from the cold, but beaming. "Hi everybody, sorry I'm late. There was a wreck on the highway. Look what I got!" He held up a bloody wallet that looked like it was thick with a wad of bills, and a severed finger with a large diamond ring still on it.
Gramps stared at the swag and then asked hopefully, "Didn't you bring anything to drink?"

Silver Moments

Tom West, the hero of “The Soul of a New Machine” by Tracy Kidder once said to his assembled “Eagle” developers, “There are no golden moments.” This was meant to convey to them that winning (against FHP, the competing Data General computer being developed in Research Triangle Park, NC) does not happen in an instant of time. It was to be a continuous process with few, if any, “Eurekas!”
George W. Bush has had no golden moments in his presidency other than possibly his visit to the World Trade Center rubble after 9/11. However, he has had a series of smaller victories that are slowly outlining his legacy:

1) The swift defeat of the Al Qaida in Afganastan.
2) The realignment of America’s anti-terrorism efforts and the resultant hiatus in terrorist attacks inside the U.S.
3) The swift defeat of Iraq’s military.
4) The movement of the Supreme Court (and lower courts) back towards “original intent.”
5) GWB’s steadfastness in his pledge to create a democracy in Iraq and in our efforts to quell the Iraqi insurgency. (With the aim of modernizing Middle-East politics.)
6) The reproachment between Isreal and Palestine.
7) The movement of the Pakastani government back into our association of allies
8) The “blinking” of Libya’s Quadafi and his resultant WMD disarmament.
9) The backpeddling of Syria vis a vis its Lebanon and Iraq interferances.
10) As a result of aggressive tax cuts, the continued growth of U.S. economy after 9/11, the bursting of the internet bubble, a wide litany of corporate scandals, and a vexing series of natural disasters. This economic growth has also included substantial employment expansion (over 4.5 million increase) from the low point in early 2002.
11) Numerous indictments and convictions in these corporate scandals.
12) The rearrangement of our armed forces away from cold-war bilateral posturing towards defeating “asymmetric” terrorists threats.
13) Tort reform and the rationalization of bankruptcy laws.
14) The growing isolation of Iran in the free world because of its nuclear posturing.
15) Despite “Green” opposition, the slow but steady progress toward a cogent U.S. energy policy.
16) As a result of our insistence on multilateral talks with North Korea, progress toward the removal of its nuclear threat.
17) At our instigation, the rumblings of a critical organizational restructuring at the U.N.
18) The Central American Free-Trade Agreement.
19) Despite the Libby indictment, the Bush administration has been one of the least corrupt in the last fifty years.
20) A national awareness of the looming crisis in the Social Security System.
21) The No Child Left Behind national educational improvement program.
22) A gradual erosion of the blatant biases in the traditional left-wing media (probably more their doing than Bush’s).
23) The refocusing of the American electorate toward morality and patriotism.
24) Our large national commitment and efforts in the battle against AIDS in Africa
25) The Medicare Drug benefit (a dubious achievment).

This is not to say that Bush has not had his negatives: inattentiveness to the growing budget and trade deficites, our illegal immigrant problems, our poor relationships with Russia and China, and the proper vetting of some of his appointments. Hopefully, he, with Congress’s and his staff’s help, will start to fix these failings before the end of his second term … and flesh out some of the above positives

Connecting the Dots

Truth is the first casualty of war. The irony of this catch-phrase is that both sides (pro and anti) are unabashedly tossing it around to undermine the lying bastards on the other side.

Ordinary citizens are hopelessly un-served by the modern news-as-business mechanism.
The sound bytes, spins, headlines and pictures provide eye candy and mind candy, which leaves us uninformed - but often absolutely certain that we are right. Yet, hardly anyone in the business of news is getting paid for finding out the real facts. People get paid for selling newspapers, ads, magazines and clicks. Editors, reporters, analysts....Everyone is now in the info-tainment business.

Writers of news have always been in competition to break the big story, but I truly believe that the current generation of readers and writers is less bound by traditional constraints when it comes to Truth and Character.

One of the sad casualties of the commercial of news is factual evidence. The favorite game of talking head pundits is called "connect the dots." Invariably, they will cite several seemingly related speculations and then summarize with the connect-the-dots certification.

This plays to an inherent human penchant for filling in the blanks when given insufficient information. More often than not this leads to false speculation. And many folks are predisposed to accept "facts" that support what they already believe. The Shepherds flock: sheep.

We see it all the time in business. Everytime we see a good looking woman with great ta-tas getting the promotion we deserved, we begin to speculate about how she got the job (over coffee and jelly donuts with the other fat losers in the cafeteria). Pretty soon the rumor of her dalliance with Mr Big has taken on all the appearances of fact. The more people who repeat it the more likely it is to be perceived as true. Truth is, we are more attracted to the seamy explanations than to the more factual yet un-titillating details. She probably got her MBA sleeping with the profs, anyhow.

Those of us who want to know the facts are generally presented with some random dots and not much pith. Stay tuned for my next blog - which contains the cure for Your Disease!

Blog Log

Out of curiosity (and ego) I recently Googled “Liddy AND Libby”, “Libby AND ‘blood lust’”, “Libby AND Valachi”, “Libby AND McDougal” and various other tripart combinations of same to see if I could turn up a reference to my latest post on this blog site. Each of these searches turned up many pages of recent references to these word key combinations (in as many as one hundred other sites). I kept refining these references trying to narrow things down to the “DumpF*cks” blog but nothing worked. My conclusion is that not only is this excellent blog site obscure, but also that my prose is also not as original as I had thought. What a downer!!

Blood Lust

What do G. Gordon Liddy and I Lewis Libby have in common? Other than the obvious appelative similarity, they both have offered themselves (or been offered) as sacrificial lambs on the blood-soaked sands of the leotine media arena. It is an obvious but strange truth that reporters, once sensing political weakness, are not satisfied until there is a partisan jugular ripped open. (They then invariably go to sleep under a banyan tree while the other political impalas prance off into the veldt.) In this case, Scooter Libby turns out to be the unfortunate victim. But, like the weirdness associated with the Judith Miller affair, there are unanswered questions as to why Libby is the one who ended up being mauled. Scooter is not dumb … and he is an accomplished lawyer. So why did he make such obvious mistakes is dealing with the Special Counsel, Fitzgerald?

He gave evidence to the Grand Jury that was directly contraverted by documents he had also given them. He indicated that reporters and newscasters told him about Valarie Plame when they testified that they hadn’t. Why? The speculated answer was that V.P Chaney was his source and that Libby was protecting his boss. But he didn’t need to do this since Chaney had every right to discuss Plame and her husband, Joe “Yellow Cake” Wilson, with Scooter. I like to think that he did what he did to sate the media’s blood lust and, as a consequence, allow the Bush administration to get back to the business of fighting the war on terror. I also think that his punishnment will be mild if at all. And, if worse comes to worse, he will be pardoned when Bush leaves office in 2008.

But there is one other possible explanation – perhaps he was protecting instead Judith Miller as Cheney’s mole at the NY Times … or, even more likely, his paramour? Maybe, Miller would not rat Libby out until he assured her (on that personal phone call) that he would not reveal their secret(s)? (Note the similarities between Susan McDougal’s memory lapses when she stayed in the slammer to protect crooked-dick Clinton, her suspected lover.) After all, every other media luminary had blabbed on Libby to Fitzgerald with the ease of Joe Valachi spilling the beans on the Cosa Nostra. So much for reporters ”protecting” their news sources … particularly if these sources are from the right.

Vast Right Wing Conspiracy

Pardon me, but I have to snigger just a bit. Clooney in his righteous pontification and querulous pondering over the "Miller Miasma" - has drawn our attention to what might have been a meaningless whisp of smoke on a distant hill.

He was right to smell a scortched rat in Judith Miller's quixotic saga. The crackers in the bedlinen for Clooney is that he has uncovered - not a donkey-rat - but, rather, an elephant-rat.
It turns out that Miller is not the NYT left wing commie journalist that Clooney wanted to "out."
Nope. Now, it appears that she has instead been a longtime shill for the neo-cons in the administration, selling the war in exchange for insider tips that she did not have the security clearance to have access to.

Most of us do not considering it treason just because someone leaked the fact that administration dissident Joe Wilson was married to a CIA researcher who sat at a desk in D.C. most of the work day. And, we have always wondered why - if there was a crime committed - why was not Robert Novak the one who was in jail?

Now, the real story here is unfolding painfully for Clooney and his ilk. It is becoming common fodder that the neocons were very guilty of egregiously leaking secret information to the press in a Faustian bargain of doom for all involved.

For this abuse of power, the US Constitution provides harsh penalties. Thanks Clooney, for keeping the kleiglights focused.

Miller Miasma

I know I am getting very tiresome with this Judith Miller thing. But I am still bothered by the miasma surrounding this affair. Ms. Miller testified in front of the grand jury for the second time yesterday to answer more questions that arose after she had delivered to the special prosecutor last week a relevant E-mail that had been previously “overlooked.” Two things in particular gnaw at my craw:

1) You would think that Ms. Miller had plenty of time to remember all the details of her interactions with Scooter Libby as she was pacing the floor of her cell for three months. The fact that a significant document/event was left out of her first testimony is disturbing to say the least … and I think reflects on Ms. Miller’s veracity and her point of view. (I don’t believe the canard that she was a shill for Bush during the invasion of Iraq and therefore still is … she works for the NY Times after all.) I thought the slammer was supposed to “focus one’s mind.”

2) Ms. Miller’s attorney has admitted that Ms. Miller had had conversations with other people about Valarie Plame and that details about these other “leaks” were not discussed in her testimony as per the terms of her release from jail. Why is it that only Scooter Libby can be “outed” and her other sources can be kept behind the shroud. Doesn’t the special prosecutor have an obligation to get the “best evidence?” I can’t believe that these other interactions are not relevant to whatever determinations are made in this case. And if there are indictments, would not the defendents have every right to this information? Has the special prosecutor not painted himself into a corner with his treatment of Ms. Miller? (Perhaps that was his intent?)

Vexing Doubts

What are we to think about a supreme court nominee who reportedly was not joking when she said that George W. Bush is "one of the most intelligent men I have ever met." ?

Is this someone who has demonstrated the wisdom and experience to serve on the most powerful arm of US government?

Should we be afraid?

Was that an acorn falling from an oak tree or is the sky falling?

Carpe Autumn

There is nothing as magic as an early morning stroll under a bright New England sky in October. The crisp, moist air hangs like golden wisps of smoke, whispering apples and pumpkins. Emily Dickinson found the slant of light on Winter afternoons to be oppressive, but the hue and angle of the light in Autumn is a tonic for the soul.

You can feel the promise of frost in the air. One night very soon, the tomato vines and marigold leaves will turn black. We will pull them up and toss them on the compost pile.
We will not mourn, though we will miss the fresh tomatoes and golden color of the marigold blossoms.

We who love the seasons welcome Winter. We do not carp about weather. We celebrate the changes in the skies. These changes give us a sense of urgency - adding punctuation to our life sentences. As we see the lifeline getting shorter, we eschew comfort and tedium. We embrace the challenge of slip and skid against our aging bones. Let the winds and seas rage. Let the snow pile high. Let the power lines fail and the toilets freeze. We'll survive.

Or, maybe not.

In our hearts, we know that the temperature of the earth is constant at a depth of six feet. And, lord knows, there will be plenty of time for that.

What Bennett Said

I am seldom surprised these days by the collective ignorance and short attention span of the public. But, I am still naïve enough to expect the mainstream news to demonstrate an appearance of neutrality when it comes to reporting the facts.

An egregious example of bias is provided in today's Boston Globe, page A2 in a small, but prominently displayed piece, culled from the AP wire.

"THE NATION TODAY
Bennett's comments on abortions criticized
October 1, 2005
Washington, D.C.
The White House yesterday criticized former Education Secretary William Bennett for remarks linking the crime rate and the abortion of black babies. ''The president believes the comments were not appropriate," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said. Bennett, on his radio show, ''Morning in America," was answering a caller's question when he took issue with the hypothesis put forth in a recent book that one reason crime is down is that abortion is up. ''But I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down," said Bennett."

This - seemingly factual - rendering of the story is almost criminal in it's misstatement of the simple facts. The most poffesnsive sentence in the AP story "when he took issue with the hypothesis put forth in a recent book that one reason crime is down is that abortion is up" is a lie.

Bennett was not taking issue with the statistical reportage of the book (Freakonomics). He was making an important point to demonstrate that government policy cannot be based simply upon the statistics. He said "economic arguments should never be employed in discussions of moral issues".

What the Globe (or was it the AP?) left out of the story was the actual point of Bennett's statement:
"That would be an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down."
Bennett is clearly an opponent of abortion. Anyone who actually thinks he was advocating a position favoring the abortion of any color of unborn babies is a fool.

Naturally, The White House issues a dumpfuck statement to mollify the Jesse Jacksons and Al Sharptons who feed on the public's ignorance, and the predictable outrage of lefties who never read the full story will resound for weeks.

The disturbing thing about this is that it is the latest in a series of examples of the media failing in their role as factual presenters of what, when, where and how. A pair of incidents that come to mind are the flap in DC in 1999 over the use of the word "Niggardly" Earlier this year Harvard President Lawrence Summers got misquoted (and roundly criticized) when he spoke about the disproportionate representation of woment in science.

These are just a few examples of apparent misunderstandings that were NOT corrected by a fact-centered press.
A cynical person might even suspect that the rascals in the editorial room may have intentionally withheld clarifications to generate even more juicy news in the reactions of a dumpfuck public.

Schmaltz Herring

There is still something fishy about Judith Miller’s release from jail. (I’m not the only one who thinks so … just about every talking head is a scratching head over the circumstances surrounding this springing.) Ms. Miller says that she needed her source’s (Lewis Libby’s) oral assurance that she was released from her pledge of confidentiality even though she had a year-old signed statement from “Scooter” to this same effect. In other words she spent 12 weeks in the hooscow because she didn’t think it was proper to call Mr. Libby for this same (redundent) oral assurance. (He was apparently supposed to call her first.) This just doesn’t ring true.

However, I believe that the key to this puzzle can be found in this morning’s NY Times news story, viz, “Ms. Miller and her lawyers said she had agreed to testify because her source had released her from any pledge of confidentiality AND BECAUSE SHE HAD RECEIVED A GUARANTEE FROM THE PROSECUTOR IN THE CASE THAT HE WOULD RESTRICT HIS QUESTIONS TO THE ONE SOURCE.” (Caps mine.)

What is this? Was there more than one source? But, even though there seems to be much more to this story, most of the news media have slavishly followed the red-herring trail laid out by the Times and its lawyer. And, on top of that, these Casandras also get to use this story to plead for more legal protections from reporters’s having to disclose confidential sources (see the lead editorial in this same issue of the Times). Unbounded hubris thy name is Punchy Sulzberger.

Will we ever find out “the rest of the story”? I doubt it. But I can dream. And in my chimera the special prosecutor calls Ms. Miller back in in about a month and asks her about these other source(s) or even other piscene events based upon new testimony from others. (“How many other sources were there?” “Did they tell you things before or after Lewis Libby did?” “What did they tell you about Valarie Wilson, etc.?” “Who are they?”) If Ms. Miller again hides behind the First Admendment (or better yet the Fifth Admendment), then we at least know the degree to which most in the “free press” are willing to engage in duplicity and slight of hand to put forward their political agenda. And Ms. Miller will again be wearing stripes.

Deficit Attention Disorder

President Bush is getting thumped by everyone these days. That the Democrats cannot find anything good to say is not surprising. But nowadays it is becoming chic for the conservative talk hosts to break with the party line.

A few months ago they would have been roundly criticized by their own for giving aid and sucor to the enemy (Lefties). Now that lockstep thinking is falling apart. The widening gyre of public opinion seems to be skewing against the party in power.

There is a general feeling of "They can't get the job done." This applies to a multitude of topics, from closing our borders to illegal immigration, to disaster relief, to Iraq, North Korea, Africa, space, etc. The daily news is a constant reminder of how poorly things are going in our diplomatic relations and foreign policy.

Today Jeff Jacoby, the Boston Globes's pet conservative, wrote one of his best columns - which took the Republican-dominated governemnt to task for helping Bush blow the reality lid off of national spending. What happened to the Republican reverence for small government? Jacoby notes that the unrestained, unbalanced power of Republicans in congress and in the white house has resulted in the corruption and arrogance that lets them add 6,000 pork addendums to a recent highway bill.

This is not Haiti; this is the US Congress.

Clear thinkers on the Conservative bench are beginning to realize that this failure to live-up to traditional Republican values has shown the incumbants to be the same hacks and whores that they decry. And the voting public might just hold the Bush administration responsible. This could the way for a smart well-funded contender in 2008 who can easily demonstrate that she could not be any worse than the rascals who drove the deficit up by trillions of dollars.

This scares the hell out of them.

New Informative link

Clooney has been humping a right wing blog penned by former frat boy Dartmouth alumni who have the amazing talent for taking an interesting issue and making it tedious to read about. Check it out for yourself. I have removed the link to the one-trick pony blog of self-described comedian Andy Borowitz.

Show me a conservative who would post a link to a liberal leaning blogger. You cannot. This is the difference between the good guys and conservatives. We are better looking, smarter, and nicer. We don't mind letting you see what the other side is affirming as fact.

We know that when you realize that these people are on the same side as that moron Sean Hannity you will suddenly realize how vapid their thought process is.

Descent into Hell

The stark images on the evening news often give us pause to be glad we are not there - wherever the disaster is taking place. We are comforted by the knowledge that our high standard of taxation has funded a rich infrastructure which can protect us from all but the worst natural events - or at least come and help us in any situation short of global thermonuclear war.

Or, maybe the self-serving bureacrats and shysters have used all the tax money on conferences and trips to Dubai. These folks - the dept of homeboy security and FEMA have aptly demonstrated that they can only perform well in well-orchestrated drills. These political hires were betting their careers on the hope that if a the Category 5 came ashore, it wwould be in Mexico or some boogerglob Island in the Carribean. They lost that bet and they shouild be fired, maybe tarred and feathered. Let us hope that this experience will serve as the wake-up call for those true dumpfucks charged with planning the safety of the citizens.

New Orleans never smelled good. If you have ever walked down Bourban Street in the Summer you had to breath through your mouth to avoid inhaling the rank odor of stale beer, rotting food and human piss. The downtown area has almost the same population as Boston. But the murder rate in NO is 10 times that of Boston. It is kind of ironic that the Hurricane is the most popular tourist drink - served in a glass that resembles a lantern shape.

The scenes from the so-called shelters in New Orleans - the convention center and the superdome arena are mind boggling. Hellhole defined. No Electricity, 90 degree heat, no water no plumbing and no food. Add 30,000 people. Now you have proof that God apparently hates poor people. One salient fact - everyone in New Orleans is either bone thin or Micky Dees fat - and most of them and their kids are fat. It did not require the skills of a trained systems analyst to notice that most of them are black.
The media is having a field day spotlighting those camera flies like Jesse Jackson who want to call it racism, because the relief did not arrive fast enough to save everyone.
There are some real questions that need answering about the response, but I see that most of the people who are arriving to help are white. How is that racism?

Another interesting contrast. In the Mississippi coastal towns where the people are just as black and just as poor as the city folk, you did not hear the cry "Where is the government? They need to give us help." The Mississippians were saying, "We lost everything, but we are alive. We will just have to start rebuilding." It seems the independent spirit still survives in the rural towns and counties.

There is a big lesson in all this tragedy and loss. Most of us urban and suburban folk are are just a few days away from Hell - if the power goes off (no ice, no TV, no A/C), if the 7-11 runs out of milk or tonic water, if the weekly paycheck does not arrive, or the plumbing stops working. Many of us are - like the unfortunate folks in New Orleans - mostly dependent on a just-in-time infrastructure.

It is shameful that so many are in such a hurry to politicize this event. It's appalling to hear the usual gang of idiots rushing to exploit this tragedy to further a ideological agenda.

One thing I would add to FEMA's list of "To Do's" in preparation for the next major disaster: Shoot the first looters you see carrying anything but food. I guarentee this will stop looting before it get's to be a form of entertainment.

Perpetual Tedium

I was at a party the other night and there was - as there always is - someone who wanted to discuss quantum physics.
I am the first to admit it, I was drinking heavily, trying to wash the acrid taste of route 95 out of my head. It was working pretty good until this Poofta started some speil about how the Hubble Telescope had taken pix of a galaxy 14 Billion light years away.

Hmmn. My tormentor was willing to take for granted that these rocket scientists and other guys with hi tech degrees actually know what they are talking about. Gee, are these not the same people who wreeck space vehicles and blame the problems on a bad fuel pump or a pirce of gap filler sticking out. Pardon me - I don't believe a word of it.

There is absolutely no proof of this big bang malarkey

Judith Miller in the Floss

Over the last two mornings on Imus, discussion has centered on the Judith Miller affair. Apparently, according to James Carvell, the blogasphere, and Beltway skuttlebut, Judith Miller is claiming 5th admendment (not the 1st admendment) protection in her testemony in front of the grand jury. (You are not allowed to claim the 5th admendment in front of a grand jury ... thus her imprisonment.) The speculation is that Ms. Miller was the original source of the outing of Valarie Plame to Karl Rove and Lewis Libby. The question then becomes -- who told Judith Miller? Wouldn't it be funny if Judith Miller's source turns out to be Joe "Yellow Cake" Wilson (Valarie Plame's husband) or some other Democrat operative? Stay tuned.

I was just thinking

... for those of you who click on the "Naked Pictures" link,
Is there anything less sexy than a shaved twat? I think I would rather look at an empty eye socket.
God was right to surround that particular orifice with kink and curl. Especially for true Redheads.
This is a good argument for why Intelligent Design should be taught in our schools.

Mobile Aggravation

Ok, some of you people out there are starting to piss me off. Sorry if you see yourself here but if so you should know what a thoughtless boor you are.

Yes, I'm talking to you if you are the slovenly dressed matron at the deli counter in the supermarket today. You were calling attention to un-comely self by talking loudly into one of those hands-free cell phones. Not only were you rudely yakking loudly as if you were talking to someone accross the room, but the content of your side of the conversation revealed you to be a twit of the first order. And loudly announcing your order for a pound of ham did not enhance your standing. Most of us in hearing range were imagining and possibly hoping for a Mama Cass deathbed scene with the EMT's vainly trying to clear the way with a plumber's plunger.

Yes I am also talking to you - cute young thing at Starbucks. I was gratified to learn that your roomate has finally got those silicon puppies she has been wanting for so long. And I was pleased to hear how natural they looked. You have a nice tan too, and I would not spoil your day to remind you that at 37 your skin will l resemble the hide of an African elephant. Your inconsiderate loud talking shows how shallow you are; and I notice that your black Beamer is parked in the handicapped space. You are so right to assume that the cops never bother the violators here at coffee central. No one in a wheelchair would waste their precious energy to get in there to spend twice as much as it costs at White Hen Pantry for a cup of coffee.

Yes I am talking to you, at the restaurant drawing attention to yourself by your silly ring-tone (The Theme from Hawaii Five-O) and your self-important "I need to tak this call." But do you politely excuse yourself and walk out to the lobby or even outside to talk? No, of course not, because you are an asshole. You thoughtlessly freeze the conversation of your dinner mates by talking to some interloper who happens to have your cell phone number. You think it is entertaining to the others?

Yes, I am talking to all of you self centered spoiled brats and your mobile devices. Go ahead and yak your heads off. You have spawned the next big wave of technology which is coming soon: The Mobile Connection Zapper. These devices which jamm any nearbye cell phone connection are already available and employed in Europe.

I cannot wait to get my hands on one.

Snakes and Alligations

Florida Governator Jeb Bush was happy to have Hurricane Dennis to blame for widespread destruction this weekend. It took the spotlight off the low-key admission by the state AG office that it was dropping it's investigation into the Schiavo case. After looking at the facts the prosecutor's office grudgingly announced that there was "no evidence of wrondoing" in the allegations that Michael Schiavo had participated in his wife's mysterious collapse.

Will this put the matter to rest for the staunch conservatives who want to play God with the constitution? Hardly. These zealots are not much different than the Mullahs and Ayatollahs who want to enforce their brand of "morality" on the world.

Facts that are inconvenient are shunted to the caboose of awareness. So the Die-hards will never believe that the courts are right when they think the majority of judges voted "left".
Politically, those who cannot compromise are doomed. They have always been run out of office by a reasoned and reasonable majority. Even when they appoint judges to the highest courts, the judges are often turned to the "dark side" by the power of reasoned argument -except Scalia and Thomas, of course.

Et tu, Clooney?

Ejaculations

Clooney (see below July 5th) needs to return to this Planet. After six weeks of total silence despite the pithy and substantive issues that have been analyzed on this forum, he betakes himself from his tidy cocoon and renders for us a riddle of piddling importance.

Like we give a fiddlers fart whethera photon is a particle or a glint of God's eye. We here are concerned with things of this earth or at least this astral plane. The big bang is simply the scientist's way of saying "We haven't got a clue what happened, or when or why. We call it the big bang because we seldom get laid, so we think creation sounds like an explosion. "

What the Hubble telescope saw could easily be explained by a refracted reflection from an upstairs lavatory at Buckingham Palace for all we know. Come back to earth, Clooney.
Never mind speculating on how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. Get someone to do a lap dance on your Photonic Special Purpose.

Perpetual Motion

Hey Einstein here's a poser: How can a photon traveling at the speed of light (186,000 miles per second) … for almost 14 billion years … and oscillating about 10^15 times a second ... not represent perpetual motion? All this is done with the total photon energy of only about 1/10^42 ergs (an erg is 23.9 billionths of a calorie)? (This analysis is taken from the fact that the Hubble telescope has picked up light from a far distant galaxy ... formed about the time of the big bang.)

Apology

I owe those dumpfucks at AOL an apology.
Now it looks like it was my machine that was screwed-up after all. God I hate it when I am wrong. And, I was the worst kind of wrong - stubborn, annoyed and probably a little insensitive after 3 or 4 frosty Sierras.

Well, the nice kid at the Taipei help desk followed-up with me personally and politely offered a few suggestions about cleaning up my temporary internet files folder and to re-set some settings that had probably been tinkered-around with by some spamination popup adware.

I also deleted the Mozilla browser and related files from my system. I think it is highly over-rated in terms of functionality and a pig to run. Ever since I installed it my system has been running slower and more clunkily.

The kid was good. He was genuinely sorry about the problem I was having. Despite my previously loutish behavior. It kind of makes you humble to be forgiven by a stranger.
My system runs fine now. Thanks to the helpful guy on the outsourced AOL help desk.
- Mr. Meek

Michael Jackson is Not Guilty

And I have an 18 inch dick!

Pretending Nothing is wrong

For the past two days, AOL has been unable to provide the service of accessing any address that was identified as http:// or www. This effectively eliminated me from accessing 80% of the features that AOL charges me for. Mail and IM still worked and so did their inane chatrooms. But none of the links worked, unless they were a secured connection (Https://) Perhaps this is interesting news to the advertisers who were charge by AOL for broken links. I know I found it annoying - more so since the AOL help system requires internet access. So there is no explanation, and no one to call to complain to.

Today, the access mysteriously returned. Hey, I am a curious type of guy so I decided to try to contact the online help desk for an explanation. I figured maybe they could shed some light on the situation - you know, power outage, disk crash, something I could understand.

I typed my question: Why couldn't AOL connect to www for two days?
The Tech: I understand that you cannot connect to the Internet.
Me: No I can connect now. I want an explanation why AOL could not provide service for the past two days.
Tech: Lets check some settings on your computer.
Me: It isn't anything about settings. It doesn't have anything to do with my system. AOL could not provide service and I want to know why?
Tech: are you currently signed on to the computer that was giving you the problem?
MR: Let me Talk to your supervisor if you do not understand my question.
Tech: Ok I will connect you with my supervisor. But first I need some information.
ME: NO you are wasting my time. I am logging off in five seconds.
Supervisor: Hello. I am The supervisor it is a pleasure to speak with you.
Me: Can you answer the question, please?
Supervisor: I understand that you cannot access the Internet.
Me: GOODBYE!
(Logs off AOL and makes a mental note to terminate service with this Dumpfuck outfit)

This is what is wrong with America - no one speaks English anymore.

One Friday Night in Billerica

MAGGIES is my favorite whorehouse in Billerica. I go there often, sometimes to get the old bean snapped and sometimes just for a relaxing after work drink with women who reek of cheap perfume, who walk around wearing only their underwear, and who seem to understand me.
The place is run by a large black skinned grandmother with a wide, wet mouth. She reminds me of my friend George's big friendly dog. She is always glad to see me, and I always end up with stains on my pants.
"Hey Girls!" she shouted to the others when I stopped in last Friday, "Look who de cat drug in! It Mr. Johnson. Evebody look real pretty now."
"Hey Maggie," I yelled, "Still got the hots for me?" She gave me a wanton smile and grabbed her crotch.
"Right here same as always. Come and git it, baby" Then she fixed me with a mock scolding expression while she wrapped me in her huge, wet, welcoming hug.
"Where you been, honey? You be bad." She said. "Lenore and Cindy there startin' to think you is gone somewhere else."
She nooded at the two beautiful whores sitting at the small bar. They were both wearing silky slips that hardly covered their shapely bodies. Lenore in red was tall, dusky and muscular. She had a gifted tongue and firm tits that stood high on her chest like proud melons. Cindy, the redhead, was short with baby blue eyes and red lips that contrasted her white, lightly freckled face. She almost had on a kelly green silky slip. My favorite color. They were both smiling at me like I was the best thing that had happened to them all day.
"Probably you been off Lovin' some foreign ho's," Maggie was still scolding mirthfully, "probably started going to one o' them stuck-up places in Concord or Lincoln..." Her good natured melodious voice was like an old song. She held my
arms with her big hands demanding an accounting of where I had been lately. I looked into her dark eyes as she licked her lips with a long pink tongue.
"Maggie, Maggie. You should know better than that. This is the only place I come - for loving," I lied with a big charming smile.
"Well, we glad to see you anyway, ain't we girls?"
The two whores at the bar said in unison "Hi Jiles. Looking for some fun?"
I shook my head no.
"Not tonight girls, I just came for a couple of beers."
They pretended to be disappointed, but cheered up when I walked over to the bar gave them each a long lingering tongue-kiss, and finally took a seat at the bar. Cindy went around and opened a cold Beck's which she poured into a pilsner glass. We chatted about the weather, the latest movies we'd seen, work, and politics. It was pleasant and relaxing. Several other johns came and went upstairs with
other hookers.
After a few beers it was time to get going. But I had to take a leak before the ride home. I excused myself to go to the toilet. There was a sign on the door that said "Gents/Ladies." Unisex. It was spotless, with the aroma of lilacs. Several stalls lined one wall, two ice-filled urinals were hung on the far wall. There was a huge mirror over the row of sinks. I went to a urinal, drilled a hole in the ice while I tried to read the jokes people had scrawled around the free condom machine. It was blurry without my reading glasses. Over the sink, there was a large hand painted sign that said:
"Employees must wash genitalia before returning to work."
Clean, I thought, washing my hands with soap, so clean you could fuck on the floors here. It gave me such a warm feeling that I changed my mind about leaving. I went back to the lounge and flipped a coin. Tails it was Cindy. I would be home late again tonight, I thought to myself, following Cindy up the circular staircase to her room, hypnotized by her lilly white bare bottom peeking out under the short green slip.

Clooney's toothless pontification

OOh, I was really destroyed by such penetrating retorts as: "And by the way -- isn't "Conservatives are BAD and Liberals are GOOD" an example of black and white thinking?"
and I might have been more chastised had my words about the futility of conservatism been quoted correctly.

But Clooney clearly identifies with the current bunch of red-neck-jerk Republicans who like to find irrelevent factoids to nuance their own stuck mindsets. He points out that Republicans had the majority so it was ok to hold Clintons appointees in Committee, but the Democrats are dastardly because they are using parlamentary procedure in an attempt to prevent a losing vote.

No thinking person can avoid seeing through the specious Republican logic, the same thinking that has gotten us into a global mess. I have to smile, because they are simply paving the way for a Hillary landslide in 2008. The majority of the country is turning away from the current administrations policies, choices and the growing economic shithole.
Any gains the republicans achieve by the power grab will be erased by the next generation of moderate-progressive leaders.

Where is the proof that those Popes who Clooney says commissioned those great works of art were not also buggering little boys?

Nuance Schmooance

DEN says in his recent update:
“He [his work/lunchmate] gets red in the face just thinking about the unreasonable Dems who are trying to block the appontment of conservative judges. It got a little scary at lunch today - I thought he was going to have a stroke because I said that the Republicans were every bit as evil as the Dems and have played thir [sic] own tricks to block nominees in the past. It dawned on me that those whose brains demand black and white answers tend to be conservative. Creative minds - with a high tolerence for ambiguity and an inability to accept binary choices - tend to be liberal. The comforting thought is that despite the current lack of character in moderate leadership - conservatives always lose - at least they have so far in the history of intellectual, artistic and political experience.”

This supposed nuanced argument that liberals hold (that their judges were also blocked in the past by Republicans) neglects one salient fact. When Republicans were blocking judges in the 90’s, THEY WERE IN THE MAJORITY. They tied a few of these “out of the main stream” Clinton nominations up in committee because they had the votes. Now Dems, who don’t now have the votes, have been tying up (mostly appelate court) nominees with the use of the filibuster. It sounds to me that the libs are the ones with binary [mis]thinking. And as far as that last assinine statement is concerned -- about conservatives being the enemy of intellectual thought, politics, and the arts; I can think of no greater age of barren ideas, artistic achievement and political gain than the 1960’s, the cradle of our current liberal nihilists. And the Popes, who commissioned all that great Renessaince art, as far as I can recall, were not campaigning for same-sex marriage.

And by the way -- isn't "Conservatives are BAD and Liberals are GOOD" an example of black and white thinking?

Lost

I triied to watch the "Lost" season finale tonight, but as it did early in the year, it lost me. I was bummed by the unconscionable number of commercials and useless fodder in the screenplay. I was constantly aware that I was watching a TV show. The writer's manipulations were just stupid. There is no integrity of character; everyone changes thier behavior every week. The plot went very quickley from cliffhanger to "Jump!"

So much for TV. A vast wasteland and worse. I hear the Fox was the leading network this season. That about sums it up.

I started a new job this week. The only drawback to being a contractor is that the regular, stiving ass-licking employees see no benefit to eating with the hourly help. This would be no problem for me, except that due to the inclement weather, I have been stuck going to the cafeteria with a programmer who is from the great liberal bastian of Florida. He gets red in the face just thinking about the unreasonable Dems who are trying to block the appontment of conservative judges. It got a little scary at lunch today - I thought he was going to have a stroke because I said that the Republicans were every bit as evil as the Dems and have played thir own tricks to block nominees in the past.
He couldn't recall anything as heinous as the current Democrats who coyuldn't understand that the dictionary defines democracy as Majority Rule. If you ain't in the majority, tough titty.
I could not wait to flee the lunch room and get back to my cube.
Maybe the weather will clear up tomorrow ad I can go for a walk instead of getting harranmged by some fat southern redneck conservative.
(I might as well be having beers with George, for cripes sake!)
It dawned on me that those whose brains demand black and white answers tend to be conservative. Creative minds - with a high tolerence for ambiguity and an inability to accept binary choices - tend to be liberal. The comforting thought is that despite the current lack of character in moderate leadership - conservatives always lose - at least they have so far in the history of intellectual, artistic and political experience.
So maybe it is only some who are Lost.

Mobile Civility

Earlier this week, USA TODAY reported the results of a poll to determine what annoys Americans the most. The answer: Cellphones.

The only surprising thing about this is that I am so in-synch with mainstream opinion.

Do you remember what it was like in the old days? People called you at the office or at home and left a message with your secretary or on your answering machine, You called them back when you were available. Unless you were a physician on call or a bookie, you didn't need to answer every incoming call - especially when you were out in a restaurant or other public place. If it was really important to talk with someone and you were away from your phone, you used a phone booth. It was all very civil, private and effective.

Then came these infernal gadgets that allowed your calls to follow you around. It started with simple pagers which merely beeped or buzzed to notify the carrier of an attempted call. The beepee had an option to find a phone and return the call, or wait for a more convenient time. These once benevolent gadgets, like the Mokwai in the movie "Critters" have evolved into the most diabolically annoying piece of technology since the invention of the Radar Gun.

Today, you can walk into any shopping mall and for a few hundred dollars you can walk out with a fully functioning mobile instant messaging custom ringtone speaker cell phone camera. This small device can reach out and annoy anyone within earshot while you cluelessly yammer with your peeps.

What is it about this bit of technology that irritates the living shit out of people like me? Are we curmugeons or are you thoughtless buffoons to blame?
It seems like some of you consider it as your license to be rude. Nowadays you cannot go to a bar or restaurant or stand in a line without someone conducting a half-witted phone conversation at a decibel level that cannot be simply ignored. Try and drive down to Starbucks and you will most likely be cut-off by some young blonde babe in a black beamer who is not paying attention because she has a cell phone pressed against her ear. Then when you get to the coffee shop everyone there is yakking to business contacts or gabbing about
people you don't know. The whole mobile phone thing is terribly annoying, distracting and rude.
What happened to civility?

Blow Off

belivce it ir bit U tuoed thus wgike kube wuthgoyt kiijub ar rgew jets.
(believe it or not I typed this whole line without looking at the keys.)

Boy just hacking around on a Saturday night. We were supposed to have the Nolans for dinner tonight but my wife pretended to be sick and we cancelled them, again. I don't know why she feels compelled to invite them. Probably because theykeep including US at their dinner parties. The Jamesons dropped us because they don't like our dog. He is what is known in the Dog Owners' circles as a "Crotch-Sniffer."

Actually the only fun we have when the Nolans come over is watching the look on Delvin's face when he gets his greeting crotch sniff. And Julie's face when the dog licks her knees. We get a kick out of that. Hey, get over it, it's only dog saliva - the same tongue that just wiped his ass after a nice squat. Ha ha. We don't have much in common with them anymore. They are good looking and full of fun. We are tired all the time from our important work and hobbies. We really don't have time to devote to friends who don't adore smelly animals.

We are bored with the Nolans anyway, so we hope they drop us like the Jamesons did. We don't need them, we have friends who own dogs and who will still invite us to come over with the dog. The Pratts don't care what you smell like, you are always welcome.

Hey I gotta go, COPs is on and I don't want to miss it.

Runaway Dumpfuck

A lot of news attention has been focused upon the recent disappearance of the Bride-to-be four days before her high-pressure wedding. Then, Fox, CNN, legitimate news networks as well as the American public were all disappointed by the discovery of the missing Ms Wilbanks, alive, unmolested and suffering only a bad haircut.

Yesterday and today, radio talk shows are still yakking about it. Some irate opinionators are calling for the lock-up and punishment of the same person whose safety they were praying for just days before. (Some say God answers prayers in his own time and manner).

No one is happy about the situation, except maybe the would-be groom - who is either too dumb to know that he has been made a fool of, or is delighted with his fifteen minutes of national fame. Watching his interview with Sean Hannity last night, I am tempted to assume that both possibilities are operative.

The moral of this story is that it is not nice to fool the news media. They wanted a kidnapping, bloody sexual violence and a grisly death. They want another Scott Peterson, not a good natured Glen Campbell look-a-like who professes Christian forgiveness. He had his church pastor accompany him on the interview with Hannity. Every question was invariably answered with "Well, that's hard to say. What do you think Pastor?" And the Rev would then answer the question with a bland positive spin. e.g., "She's not crazy, she just has some issues...."

But the media will not be happy until we have learned all the dark secrets in this poor girl's closet. She must be punished for what was probably a stress-related mental breakdown. The more we see of her family and wedding party, the more we can understand her reluctance.
In my humble opinion, the worst thing she did was to tell the cops she was kidnapped. That's called making false statements to authority (The same felony that got Martha Stewart into the slammer) An understandable violation, but still one that requires justice, providing that her mental state can be established, and found culpable.

Who among us has not wanted to flee at some point when the stress got too great? Cut our hair, buy a bus ticket to Dallas, have sex with a stranger (preferably an attractive woman over 18)? Who indeed? And if discovered, wouldn't we claim to have been abducted - by aliens?

Ch-Ch-Ch- Changes

"April is the cruelest month", said TS Eliot. But who gives a shit what that British dumpfuck thought? After all, he never amounted to anything important, and his silly "Hollow Men" ended with a whimper and not a bang. Ok, I am rambling. Maybe it's the vodka shooters I had for breakfast, or maybe I'm just high, trying out a new persona.

The DFM is over. He has run out of steam. He emerged from a soup of cranial debris to personify the archetypical management ego. He was a Hollow man. He was a failure, who could not do anything right, except to record the antics and foibles of others. He was ineffective as a leader. To puff-up his own self esteem, He constantly mouthed empty B-school mottos, when at the heart, he only was in charge of a trash heap, managing the dregs of the workforce. His minions did not respect him. His superiors tolerated him. His job (and his life) was a whimper.
We have drag this metaphor out ad nauseum, and even we are tired. It is time to put the DFM and his crew into the old Blog dumpster. We need a new idea. A new arena to joust in. Heck, we might even change the name of this thing. We are up for something new. Got any ideas? Keep em to yourself, this is not an audience participation gig. If you are so smart, start your own blog.

So, anyhow, we are moving on. Join us for an thrilling ride into the no-holds-barred wrestle-mania that we call Dumpf*cks.
Housekeeping notes:
The Link to "Bills website" has been replaced by a link which readers will find much more entertaining. Bill has also been deleted as a contributor, not that it matters, since he never added anything anyway. Lefty has also been expunged, for the same reason. Clooney is still invited to contribute, but he has been on "vacation." Whether this was actually another excuse to be absent while the cosmetic surgery stitches heal, or just a fortnight at the Betty Ford Clinic, we have yet to verify.

So there you are. Change is in the wind. Smells like low tide in Chelsea.

Dump in repose

Things have been quiet here at the dump lately. Mainly because I decided to close down the dump for a while. In real life you cannot just lock the gates and tell the citizens to go somewhere else with their garbage.
But here, can be whatever I want it to be. I control the horizontal and the vertical.
Just thought you should know.
We aren't dead. We're just resting.

Pope-erama

Cheesey (the DFM) was beside himself. Virtually all the dump workers had been glued to the cobb hut’s TV watching the coverage of Pope John Paul’s death, funeral preparations, and his many life retrospectives. Nothing was getting done. The recycle area was overflowing with exurban detritus – old storm windows, out-of-fashion baby strollers, rusty charcoal grills, broken lawn furniture, etc. … to the point that it was becoming dangerous. Already one grandmother had had a stack of tires fall on her. Half of the trash compactors were broken and the lines of SUVs trying to use the remaining ones were twenty deep.

No number of threats or cajoling seem to incent the staff to get off their duffs and perform their dumply duties. Obviously, knowing that the Pope, in his youth, liked to ski and hike … and that he forgave the College of Cardinals for electing him Vicar of Christ … was far more important. Cheesey finally was reduced to doing many of the daily dump chores himself, generally poorly. After two days of this humiliation, he snapped. The Big Cheese took the TV and threw it into the brown-glass recycling bin. Whilst doing this, he was screaming anti-Catholic obscenities and flashing, with the fingers on both hands, the devil horns often seen at heavy metal concerts.

The next day he awoke with a clubfoot.

How Much Wood?

On the way into the dump this morning I ran over a woodchuck. Thinking that it was done for, I threw it into the back of my pickup expecting to make some purloo for lunch (a few onions, some potatoes, carrots, thyme, salt, and pepper … and of course the critter). As I was preparing to skin the bugger, it started moving. Now, unfortunately, the local PETA organizer, entering the cob shack for a hazardous material permit, saw this episode … and stepped between myself and the groundhog with arms akimbo, shouting. “Let this poor creature live!!” I sighed and retired to my rocking chair resigned to have a tuna on rye for my midday repast.

Within minutes Mr. PETA was on his cell phone rallying the local celery chompers to come to the rescue of the woodchuck. He also summoned a veternarian, the local media and sympethetic politicians to throw up the curtain of public opinion against we heathens who treated life and death so cavaleerly. A vet was the first to respond. He came into the cob shack and requisitioned Cheesey’s desk as an operating table. He performed a tracheotomy and inserted a feeding tube into this poor animals stomach. Within an hour the woodchuck had rallied and was moving its eyes following the vets finger movements. Now reporters were swarming around our small, personal space … knocking over our bong-pipes and dog-earing our Hustler magazines.

Pretty soon TV talk shows were also involved, setting up satellite dishes, and doing talking-heads remotes from in front of the recycling area. Pro and anti-woodchuck groups gradually gathered around … with belligerant signs such as “Up chuck the woodchuck” and “Preserve the right to lie.” Cheesy was getting more and more agitated at these intrusions. Finally, when the PETA people were distracted by their interview with Larry King, he picked up a compost shovel and gave one upside the head to this poor animal. Needless to say, the circus that was our day quickly ended … with both a bang and a wimper.

GateGate

Lardass came stomping through the door of the cobb shack that we call the office. George and Rajeed, the new guy, were already on break snuggled up to the Franklin for warmth.
George was doing yesterday's Times Puzzle humming The Pensylvania Polka. Rajeed had scoffed down the last Krispy Kreme; he wiped the donut crumbs off his beard with a guilty look, not making eye contact with his Lardness.
"Hey you fucks!" yelled Lardass. "You ate all the donuts."
George didn't look up. "You were late. We thought you were skipping break for a change."
Rajeed stammered. "I am very sorry to eat your donut, Sahib. DFM made me eat it."
Lardass scowled at me, then he broke into a wide grin.
"Well, on a different day, I might be pissed. But come out here and I'll show you why I was late."
We followed him out. The sun was shining brightly in a cloudless sky but the cold north wind was enough to turn your head around. We squinted at the sight that LA was pointing to - a huge orange pile of cloth and metal. A mountain of orange.
It had been dark when I and the others arrived and we never noticed it. Except George.
"I saw it when I came in. I figured you knew..."
"No I didn't see it. Where did all this stuff come from?" I wondered.
Then it hit me. New Yawk!
It was that dumpfuck Christo trying to get rid of 7500 useless pieces of orange cloth and metal frames. And that bastard didn't even have a dump sticker.

Jumping The Skunk

I was sitting at my desk in the Cob shack that I call my office when the phone rang. R-Ring. From the caller-id display I could see it was the Board Chairman, Hudley Brinkley. He was probably calling me to fire my ass. After the Global Warming Chart fiasco, I had called-in sick for three days instead of reporting to him as ordered. I guess I had been hoping that things would blow over. But, I guess I should have known: at the dump, the longer you leave something above ground the more rotten it gets.

Now, it would all come crashing down. I was in no mood to take shit, however. Perhaps I should have exercised more due diligence over the research project. But that did not warrant the threat of termination. R-Ring.
Ok asshole, I'm thinking, Let's get it over with. I picked up the receiver. "Hello Hudley, what can I do for you, today?"
"Good morning. I won't beat around the bush. I'm hearing some disturbing news about goings-on over there..."
"I'm not sure I get you, Hudley," I replied, wondering where this was going. "Is this about the chart mix-up?"
Hudley hesitated for a moment. "No, No. Forget about that. This is important. It's about the Blowjobs."

"Blowjobs?" Surprise! Somehow, the news had leaked-out about the recent locker-room incident, where one of the young female interns had given blowjobs to 5 of the dump staff. "Ah, yeah. So, you know about that little incident?"
"Uh Huh. My phone has been buzzing!"
"Well, not to worry. I spoke with the young lady in question. She insists she was not pressured. She has no intentions of making charges." I responded in a tone that implied that the matter was settled.

"Not exactly," he shouted, "The feminazis in town have been on a warpath. They are all over my case. They want those men punished - maybe even suspended."
"I can't do that - I need these guys to get the work done. You're talking about my whole staff!"
"Even Vernon?" he asked querulously.
"Yeah, even good old Lardass," I chuckled. "His first time, I'm betting. Turns out the gal has this fetish for unusual smells. "
"You don't say?"
"Yup, she tells me that her favorite smell is... skunk. The guys said she has a tongue like an ant-eater."
"Wow. So, how are you planning to handle the matter?" He was less agitated now. The skunk factoid seemed to calm him.
"No Krispy Kremes for a week."
"Ooh, Harsh." he marveled at my toughness.
"They deserve it. It was a disgusting thing. Poor kid, she needs a lot of one-on-one counseling to, you know, help her deal with it."
"Where is she?"
"At my crib...Resting." Referring to the rented apartment I kept in town. Hudley knew of it, and had, on occasion, borrowed the key.
"Let me know if you need any help...." I could hear him breathing heavily now.
"Good idea. Why don't you come on over tonight. Bring some wine. She likes White Zin."
"Well let's hope between the two of us, we can get that poor kid straightened-out," he said and hung-up. Yeah, I thought, and maybe a good blush BJ will help the Chairman forget about tying a can to my tail.

Daisy Chain

Four months ago, when I was running for president of the local chapter of IHOP (Inveterate Haters Of the Prolotariat), I received a number of phone calls from Daisy Weed, the midget dump harlot. I found it curious that Daisy asked me a lot of questions about how I intended to win our union election. But then Daisy had always been a true friend (and sometimes favor grantor). Although I was already our union’s business agent, I thought being the local-chapter president would give me a great deal more negotion leverage with Cheesey. So I blabbed away without any self-censorship. I told her how Cheesey was slipping me hush money, how I didn’t want to bash non-recyclers, how I no longer smoked kanja in front of the dump interns, how my belief in compost had kept me grounded, and how I planned to appeal to the swing voters by campaigning with an orang-a-tang..
The strategies and tactics that I outlined to her worked … and I won in a walk. (Some said, after they saw me at the local gay bar, that I had a man date). However, I awoke yesterday to hear that Daisy had betrayed me. She had recorded all our telephone conversations and was playing them for anyone and everone on talk-TV in order to promote her new book, “My Life as a Dump Fuck.” I was mortified by this betrayal of trust.
So I called Daisy and, in a round-about way, reminded her of the video tapes that we had recorded in some of our drug-induced por-favor sessions. “Nuf said,” she responded … and quickly dropped out of the remainder of her book tour.

Broken Charts

The presentation to the Board was going pretty well. I had pasted my chart to the wall and had produced hand-out sheet summarizing my points in 14 point Trebuchet. I was arguing that the hockey-stick curve of the chart proved that a geometric increase in trash would soon deplete our resources.

We were worse off than the US Social Security system. I was advocating for a geometric rise in my budget - staffing, training programs, equipment upgrades, land acquisition, mergers with other municipalities - the works.

The chart data had been collected by a hired team of local College students who had spent last summer doing the research and creating the chart. I saw no reason to give them credit for the work, since I as the manager had actually comissioned the work. They were mere pawns doing my bidding and of no significance. No, sir, this was MY party and I was going to squeeze every drop of personal gain that was possible out of the triumph.

One of the Board members was staring at the chart, scowling.
"What's that?"
He was pointing to a corner where some paper was curling away from the chart. A strip of paper with The title of the chart had been pasted over what appeared to be another title. It was like a piece of wallpaper that has lost its stick.

I tried to divert attention. "Oh, no worries, just a presentation malfunction."
But the insistent board member strode up to the chart and peeled away the loose strip to reveal the original title "Historical Temperature Trends in North America"

"What the fuck's going on here?" he shouted accusingly, "You're trying to pawn-off a global warming propaganda chart as the results of your 'scientific study' of trash projections?" He looked around at the other board members who were staring at the chart, avoiding eye contact with me.

"Hold on. Wait a second. I can explain" I murmered. But they were already stuffing papers in their briefcases, getting ready to go. "Ah, Maybe the original title was a typo... or..." But no one was listening. On his way out, the Chairman stopped very close to me, looking at his shoes. "In my office, tomorrow morning. 8am sharp!"

So, tomorrow I am on the carpet. A victom of outsourcing gone bad. I wonder if this could be the end of a great and lucrative career as the DFM.
Time will tell. Meanwhile, hit me with another shot of Dewers, willya barkeep?

Union Suited

Even though our dumpworkers’ union, IHOP (Idiot's Hive of Onanism and Pederasty), has been somewhat emasculated by Cheesey’s refusal to negotiate with us in other than Klingon; I nevertheless have been making steady progress in organizing the dumpworkers. My major activity has been collections. As the dumpworkers leave on Friday I hit them up (in cash) for their union dues (5% of their gross) and our birthday-cake fund ($5). Every month I also squeeze them for their pension contribution (up to 10%), our strike-fund contribution ($50), our political activism fund ($10), our apprentice education fund ($8), and our bookie’s vigorish ($25). All this money goes into a Vanguard money market fund opened by me as the only signer. Although it is against union policy, I also comingle these funds to maximize the interest return … which is then swept once a week into my own Vanguard retirement fund.

I find this arrangement very satisfying and will fight to the death to insure that our union grows bigger and stronger for the benefit of our workers.

End of an Error

It is my duty to announce that the law outlawing fox hunting at the dump with dogs takes effect at midnight. We are a humane dump that treats it's wildlife with respect and dignity.
Anyone who violates the new ordinance will be tazored, cuffed, hit with a baton, shot with non-lethal (most of the time) devices. Then they will be cuffed, stripped naked, deloused and then placed in a detention cell with a large unwashed fellow named Humper Downes. Most likely the sentence will be seven years in the pokey.
That is all,

DFM

Broken Hearts

The chart I had been studying showed that there was a huge spike in trash volume at this time each year. Mainly from discarded heart-shaped Valentine Day candy boxes. I was contemplating the idea of salvaging and re-selling these containers to the third world when the phone rang. I could see from caller ID that it was Bill, calling in sick, as usual. I let the call go to voicemail. The DumpFuck; I had fired him months ago, but he refuses to accept my authority to terminate him on the grounds that he never showed up for work. I got tired of explaining it to him.
"It's discrimination against sick people," was his argument. It doesn't really matter that he refuses to accept the shitcan, since he is no longer on the payroll. I keep telling him to stop calling-in because no one gives a crap. He will not listen. The last time I took his call, he asked how many sick days he had left!

I am too busy for these distractions. I have trash to collect and hazardous waste to dispose of. I run a crew of malingering layabouts who must be constantly prodded to get their jobs done. This union thing had caused a lot of chaos among the troops and if there is anything I hate as a manager it is dissention.

As everyone knows, I am a teamwork type of Leader. Anyone who disagrees with me is wrong and I expect the team to shun those who are not with the program. As I often have said, "There is no 'U' in Team."

I got back to my chart analysis. The line representing dumpster usage showed a steady increase over the past decade. Blips and dips corresponded to various seasonal trashflows and documented events. Examples of predictable surges were reflected in the two dimensional format. Wrapping paper following Christmas. Empty Jameson bottles after St Patty's day, Cardboard heart boxes after Valentines day, hundreds of puppy carcasses just after Kill-a-puppy-with-your-bare-hands week, that sort of thing.
I had hired a small team of College students to do the research and create the presentation quality chart. They had done meticulous work. Each significant point of the chart was annotated with a reference number, with the full text explication published in a 200 page white paper. I was pleased with the work and was hoping to impress The Board of Directors at an upcoming meeting.

I heard the lads coming in for the afternoon coffee break, so I put the chart in the desk drawer. I picked up the phone and pretended I was on a call. I didn't need to worry. George and Rajeed, the new guy, were debating the proper design for birdhouses. George had started building them as a hobby and giving them to his friends in lieu of real gifts. Rajeed thought there should be a tiny hole in the top to let in more light. George thought that such a hole would also let in more water in a rainstorm.
Just then, Lardass came in with a big unopened heartshaped chocolate box. "For my Valentine," he explained. We knew he had probably gotten it for half-price at CVS. It didn't matter that Valentines Day was 2 days ago. We nodded and smiled, but even the new guy knew that the only valentine Lardass wooed was named Sally-five-fingers.

King Soloman

This morning we found a newborn baby by the green glass recycling bin. Rajeed brought it into the cob shack and asked the Big Cheese what we should do. Just then Susan came running in claiming that it was her baby and that this is why she had been on a leave of absence for the last 4 months. Gypsy Rose, the book exchange matron who had closely followed Susan in, shouted that no … it was her child! She had delivered it last night after her eighth pint of Sneaky Pete and had forgotten where she had put it. Both then started screaming at each other and grabbing at the poor waif. Cheesey shouted for them to go stand by the Exercycle. He then sat back stroking the gray stubble on his chin. After a few moments he sagely proposed that we take the machette and cut the baby in two … and then give each claimant one-half.
At this point Lardass, shaking his head and smiling slyly, proposed, “Why can’t we just do a DNA test?”

Breaking the Golden Rule

Last week I did something really stupid. I broke a long standing, yet silent rule. I invited fellow workers from the dump over to my house to watch the stupid bowl. I had never even given them my home telephone number, let alone my address. And my worst fears came to be. They raped my refrigerator, emptied the dog, pussied the wife, broke the furntiture, lit the oriental rug on fire and finished the NY Times crossword puzzle - and all before the first half.

To make matters worse, they drank all of my beer and fine liquers, ate the dogfood from out of the bowl and pissed in the snowpeas. One of them was so drunk he bashed in my wife's brand new Mercedez - and he wasn't even driving.

Next year, we are having the party at the dump, where we usually have it, so if anything gets broken, eaten or fingered, no one will know the difference.

I heart the Dump

When the guys came in for their mid-morning coffee break, I was busy studying the chart on my desk. It was labeled "Projection of Dumpster Usage based on Historical Data." It predicted that the rate of increase in trash would soon outstrip our capabilities to haul it away.
"What's that you are looking at?" George demanded. He fancies himself quite the expert in analyzing and interpreting visual data.
"Nothing." I lied, folding up the paper so he could not see the chart. I am the boss and I don't need any know-it-all minions second guessing my analyses or decisions. Attention must be paid to authority.
"Come on, let's see it." He shouted. "What are you hiding?" He strode towards my desk. But I am not intimidated by bulk. I picked up the Taser gun that I kept nearby and pointed it at his chest. "Ha ha," he laughed, "That thing is just a cigarette lighter!"
I zapped him a good one. The tiny wires crackled. He slumped to the floor emitting a growl of pain.
Annoyed by the commotion, Lardass looked up from his paper. "Can't we all just get along?"
I didn't hear him. I was busy reloading the Taser, just in case.

Ha Ha

This morning, during our coffee break, the Big Cheese gave us all a stern lecture saying that everything we did, said or wrote had to be funny. In the afternoon, as Lonny was showing Mr. Funny how to operate our new compactor, I snuck up and hit him in the mush with a Boston cream pie.

Spanking the Hype

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I give them books, they eat the covers

It has now become crystally clear to me that I am the only one who gets it.

People, I think I made a mistake opening this thing up. The fan mail has been jamming up the circuits with brickbats aimed at recent posters who are mere graffitists. Worse, it is painfully clear that none of you can write.

Dumpfucks this is your last chance to post something that makes sense at least, preferably funny and please make it interesting (ie, not a journal of your favorite farts). If you don't want to write here, go get your own blog.

The once and still DFM

911 for the Blog

Guess I've been away too long. The blog is getting ugly. (Like my dog) Like the way it is at the dump when I am not there supervising the beasties who run the joint. No there will no union. No there will be no funny stuff posted without DFM's permission and no there will be no rainbow parties behind the high school cafeteria where the dump employees go for lunch. Tomorrow I am having a superbowl party. Yes it is a party because it is at my house and wimmens are invited. We are serving stew and potatoes with lemonade. Yes there will be a lecture to the employees who show up to not post not funny stuff. We will drink and smoke our butts off and be ready for non-union work on Monday morning. Go Pets.

Keeping it Real

It gets cold here at the dump in February. That old Montreal Express keeps chugging down from the vast wasteland to our North, pushing carloads of sub-arctic frigidity smack into our weathervanes. I was sitting at my desk, thinking about recent train wrecks when the lads came in for their morning coffee break, cursing and stamping their boots. George, of course was the first one in the door with the ever-noisome Lardass bringing up the rear. (Bill, of course, had called-in sick, ignoring the fact that I had terminated him months ago.)
"Fuck it's cold." growled George as a greeting. He tossed his grimy gloves into the corner and took up his position near the Franklin stove where it was toasty warm. Icicles drooping from his moustache gave him the momentary visage of a great walrus. "I just checked with the wicked witch of the west and it's official."

"Huh?" I said, feigning interest. Sometimes George can be very oblique. He shook his head as though to pity my inability to parse his erudition. The fact is, I have been down that maze before. George has a mind that reminds me of a pile of wire coathangers. The thoughts were all hooked together by some mystical force that defied unraveling.
Lardass couldn't resist. "Hey it's so cold that I saw this flasher over at the book exchange would not open his raincoat. He just described himself to the women."
He grinned, showing us a half chewed donut that matched his brown teeth.

I decided to take charge of the conversation. "OK guys, enough already about the weather. I want to switch subjects and get something straight. Lately, one of you, under the nom de plume Clooney, has been writing some pretty inane shit on this blog. Not funny stuff, just a sort of nonsense list of words."
"I think it's funny and pithy!" interjected George.
"I think Clooney sucks," said Lardass, "It's not funny, it's just, well you know..."
"Yes," I agreed. "So here is the deal: Clooney needs to lose the stupid remarks about the big cheese and the prolix meanderings down some strange corridor of his mind..."
"Wait a fucking minute! YOU are the one writing about 'blowing feathers up the weathervane' for fucks sake! Why is that shit ok?"
"That's poetry." yelled Lardass.
"Whatever! Here is the deal: stick with the metaphor, keep it funny, well-written and concise.
"Or what?"
"Or, I start editing."
"Fuck you, you can't..."
"I did it once before and I'll do it again. I am the DFM."
George scowled back at me as he was going out the door. "Fucking fascist!" He muttered.
But, this is my blog. I always get the last word.
So I just grinned like a Cheshire cat.

Notice of Job Action

As your business agent for our union, IHOP (Interracial Haulers of Putridity), I am obliged to call a job action in response to Russ Limberger (AKA, the Big Cheese) and his manic attempt to cause electrodes to be attached to some of our family jewels. His abhorrent actions signify his panicked state of mind and his waxing alchoholic dementia. As a consequence of this documented misfeasance, I have been authorized by our cherished union to demand that we members of IHOP:

1) Refuse to report to work here at the dump before 10 AM each day
2) Refuse to wear, under our overalls, the lace panties and fish-net stockings that Cheesey has edicted
3) Refuse to chant Gragorian paeans in front of Cheesey’s desk every Friday afternoon
4) Refuse to perform gratis any more work on Cheesey’s house or his Hummer
5) Refuse to give the “sieg heil” salute anytime Cheesey enters a room

Your union will back you (and I) in these actions and will bring the full force of the haulers of putridity union down of our boss’s headbone if he tries to break our resolve in this matter.

Signed,

George C.
Business Agent, IHOP

State Of The Dump

Mr. Speaker, Invited Guests, Citizens with Stickers, Employees

Tonight I am pleased to report that I am still in charge. (applause)
Thank you.
The state if the dump is residue.
Thanks for coming.
(Applause)
Thank you.

Perks

To: All Dumpfucks
From: DFM

This is to remind you of the generous DumpFuck Employee Pacification (DFEP) benefit that is mandatory for all workers regardless of odor, girth or need for male enhancement. Nurse Rahshit will be on site tomorrow for a short-arm inspection and a brief counseling session with each of you. Where necessary, she will administer electronic shock treatments with her battery operated fully immersable Pacification apparatus.

Not to point anyone out, or cause undue embarrassment, it seems clear that George is laying inadvertant claim to the title of "Bull-Goose-Looney" and is obviously long overdue for his quarterly jolt. I see where he has posted a highly embellished version of his recurring nightmare about random acts of voting. Perhaps it was the meds talking, but we in management see this type of trash-talking graffiti as an act of lewd insubordination. You cannot run a dump with 5th columnists pushing feathers up the weather vane.

There will be an extra Krispy Kreme for the loyal employee who delivers George to Nurse Rahshit's dumpster first thing tomorrow morning. Hogtied and gagged gets you extra points and a large dark roast coffee in a pristine "good-as-new" decorative go-cup.
That is All,

The Manager

E Pluribus Union

When I tried to bring a trade union into the dump the Big Cheese hit the ceiling. He threatened to decapitate anyone who joined IHOP (International Hetero Offerers of Porno). His rantings spooked most of the dump employees I was recruiting into my cause. I had promised them that this union would campaign for a fair salary (at least the national minimum wage), bring us health care coverage (except for any precondition – proven or suspected), and guarantee us at most a 60 hour week. I had been making good progress with them until that rat, Vernon, blurted out my plans over his third martini, when he was lunching with the Big Cheese at the China Sky.

When he came back from lunch, smelling of tangarine beef, Cheesey took me out behind the toxic drop-off site and tore me a new sphincter. He screamed that I had been his protégé, that he had had great plans for my recycling career, that he had been planning to cut me in on the kickbacks, and that I was like a big brother to him. I smiled slyly and claimed that Lardass had no basis for his allegations. It was clear that Lardass had my union campaign statements confused with my attempt to get the deadbeats here at the dump to be more productive. I had been only talking in hypotheticals to them and that I had no intention of bringing a union into the dump. After about ten minutes of this type of mendacity, the Big Cheese walked away muttering to himself.

I knew then that, if were going to be successful, I would have to cause a union vote very, very quickly. I called the National Labor Relations Board to send in observers and passed out flyers to all the dump employees as they exited the dump gates that night. The vote was set for January 30th and the NLRB promised an overwhealming show of force so that Cheesy couldn’t drive the backhoe over our cars, or send Harvey out to threated our families. The day of the vote came and, dispite the fact that Cheesy and Harvey were wearing huge hogs for sidearms, over 60% of the employees voted. (The ones not voting were mainly the “sonnys,” those who were related by blood to Cheesy.) And, of those voting, over 95% chose to be represented by IHOP.

I was elated. The Big Cheese was dispondent. The day after the election I asked to talk to Cheesy to put forward our union demands. He refused, gesturing that he no longer could understand English and proceeded to talk to me in Klingon. According to the NLRB, I then had to get an official Klingon translator to proceed with negotations. After five hours of Googling the Internet, I could find no such licensed linguist. So we, here at the dump, fell back into our old ways. The Big Cheese does slip me a twenty now and then though.

The Way We Was

When I rub elbows with the swells here in Metrowest and they ask me what I do, I respond that I am a “recycling engineer.” I used to say “sanitation engineer” but, when my back was turned, I often heard their derisive remarks … one of which invariably was “dumpfuck.” So I quickly learned that “recycling” was good and “sanitation” was bad. Now I can hold my head up whilst nibbling a cream cheese and watercress sandwich because I am now environmentally and appellatively correct. But the sweet irony of the matter is that the way we used to dispose of trash was considerably cheaper and certainly even friendlier to our cherished environment.

Twenty-five years ago most of the trash at our town’s dump was incinerated. The heat generated from this burning was used to produce steam to heat the High School, Junior High School, and eight of the nine grammar schools in town. AND the town had only two garbage trucks that collected the town’s trash on a rotating schedule that was fast, clean and efficient (if a little noisy). But, because of the protestations of a handful of tree huggers, this was edicted to be fiscally wasteful and dangerous to our environment. However, it doesn’t take Einstein to realize that two garbage trucks traveling around town for five days a week use about 1/10 of the gasoline that are consumed from every household in town sending an SUV to the recycling center on average 1.3 times a week.

To this fossil fuel squandering one must also add fiscal imprudence. We here at the dump (recycling center) recently spent five million dollars to install huge trash compactors and to destroy the old incinerator. Also, the cost of the “tipping fees” the town pays to send its trash to landfills around the state is now about twenty times what we used to pay to burry the ashes from our town’s incinerator. Add to this the fact that landfills are becoming fewer and further between. It is forecast that, by the year 2020, there will be no more land available for this “environmentally friendly” purpose. At this point tipping fees will be so prohibitive that another alternative will have to be found.

Now, environmentalists will argue that the segregation of trash into newspaper, cardboard, green glass, brown glass, clear glass, plastic, aluminum, etc. removes considerable bulk from the amount of trash actually tipped. However, there are two problems with this approach. First, because of the metastasis of this illogic, the amount of recycled material now far exceeds that which can be processed by the existing recycling centers. And that which is recycled no longer reaps the financial benefit to our town that it once did. In fact, some recycling centers now charge us to drop off newspaper, cardboard, green glass, etc. The second problem with this approach is that, because of the surfeit of recyclables, about half of such material that we get here at the dump is in fact serendipitously mixed with our unrecycled trash and sent to landfills anyway. (And think of all the wasted effort that all those tree-humping do-gooders around our “swell” town perform!)

One other unthought-through rationalism had been give by the environmentaltists to deep-six our old reliable incinerators. The effluents (from this burning of garbage), notably soot and carbon dioxide, were a clear and present danger to our state’s citizens. (This was before the “global warming” mania.) But, as it turns out, the fast growing legacy of noxious gases (methane, ethylene, etc.) vented from the vast acreage of landfills that this policy has created now threatens to match those savings which came from scrapping our incinerators. And, within a few short years, this annuity of miasma will clearly far surpass that which we thought we had eliminated. (Beware of unintended consequences!)

I do have a obvious solution for all this environmental loopyness … bring back the incinerators and trash pickup! The Big Cheese disagrees. He has gotten used to the kickbacks on the big tipping fees and from the recyclers.