My literary namesake gets ready for BUSINESS!

Why did our authors of dystopian authoritarian nightmares have to be the ones to turn out so darn prescient?

When going to private residences, for example, [the firefighters] are told to be alert for a person who is hostile, uncooperative or expressing hate or discontent with the United States; unusual chemicals or other materials that seem out of place; ammunition, firearms or weapons boxes; surveillance equipment; still and video cameras; night-vision goggles; maps, photos, blueprints; police manuals, training manuals, flight manuals; and little or no furniture other than a bed or mattress.

Hey... I'm often discontent with our government... and my office is full of blueprints... Also in my office: cameras, photos, a road atlas...

Sounds like I'm a can of acetone and a digital voice recorder away from a visit from the fire inspector.


The Raw Story: Firefighters battle terrorism
The Raw Story: Firefighters asked to report people who express discontent with the government

If you haven't seen Tom Toles' excoriation of the Washington Post's rumor-mongering article on Barack Obama, you should do so now. Toles seems to suggest that Obama has a tofu problem, but fails to ask the critical question: Has Barack Obama ever been a member of the "American Vegetarian and Vegephilia Society" and their reactionary but quixotic quest (see illustration)?

Thank you Cappy Rudyard. And now, from a distant province of Waveland, this just in via The Orstrahyun.

Rupert Murdoch Admits He Does Tell His Newspapers Who To Back And What To Print

Okay, prepare yourselves, and try not to be too shocked by this revelation :

Rupert Murdoch has admitted to a parliamentary inquiry (in the UK) that he has "editorial control" over which party The Sun and News of the World back in a general election and what line the papers take on Europe.

...

As regular readers would remember, Murdoch clearly admitted, back in June during his climate change awakening, that not only did he instruct his newspapers to push a certain reality that he favoured, but he could also muster the entire forces of his internet, newspaper, cable and TV empire to push his belief systems onto the world and change not only what they believed, but how they behaved.

Since Reverend Cavendish has taken a leading role in the Giuliani campaign’s “Keep us from losing the lunatic fringe to Mike Huckabee” triage committee, we’ve asked Cappy Rudyard to elaborate on the “Waveland Theory” that was outlined in the comments section two weeks ago.

IMF,S: Thank you for taking the time out to talk with us. How are you?
CR: My casks are bung up and bilge free, guvnor, thank ye.
IMF,S: Cappy Rudyard, can we call you Cappy?
CR: Me ma used to call me Cappy, but twere confusin’ since me pa was also called Cappy.
IMF,S: I see. Turning to the “Waveland Theory” that Old Tom floated last week, could you briefly explain it to our happy band of loyal readers?
CR: It’s like I was sayin’ to Old Tom: Ain’t ye noticed that the laws that govern the television are completely different from a what they used to be? “Black Friday” shopping news can be the lead story on Thursday, on Friday, and on the weekend? That people can talk about such dandy funk as if they be talking about news, and then take a moment about government or war and wink at you the whole time, as if they are saying: “Can you believe we both have to pretend to care about this?” It be a sea change.
IMF,S: If you only watch Fox or CNN. . .
CR: Aye, but it ain’t just them. Cast yer mind to a world in which bad economic news like the dollar fallin’ and the debt risin’ doesn’t effect what goes on in the news. Would such a thing have seemed possible eight years ago?
IMF,S: It does seem a little surreal. But you’re not suggesting a conspiracy?
CR: Nay, Young Master Imfs, I am nay suggestin’ anything of the kind. But even if I were suggestin’ a conspiracy, sometimes there are conspiracies. Ask yourself, can it really be a coincidence that you can re-arrange the letters in “Sandra Dee” to spell “Sad era end”? Instead, I am suggesting that the television is a porthole into another world entirely.
IMF,S: This is the world you call “Waveland”?
CR: Aye, ‘tis that.
IMF,S: So these are not real people we are seeing on our televisions?
CR: Ask yerself: Have you ever met a bugger as completely lacking in self-respect as Chris Matthews? Or a lobcock with as little self-knowledge as Tim Russert? And blowholes like the radio lickspittles – I don’t believe even Bob Louis Stevenson could have imagined a shuddering sphincter like Rush Limbaugh. There ain’t that many barkin’ an’ brayin’ tomfools available, and yet it seems as if they’re the only ones who wander into the studios!
IMF,S: So they are from another planet?
CR: They be from another dimension entirely. How else can ye explain their lack of empathy for human beings dying in far away lands? It’s because they have nought but scorn for our race.
IMF,S: But, why, Cappy? Why spend their time doing this?
CR: Ain’t you figured it out? They are eggin’ us on to destroy ourselves. Look how far they’ve got in such a short time. They are awaitin' our self-destruction, then to swoop into our dimension and eat our radioactive and rat-eaten carcasses like so many tasty hors d'oeuvres.
IMF,S: And are you worried that by telling others about this, you are putting yourself in danger?
CR: Young Master Imfs, I’m already between wind and water. There ain’t nothin’ the wavelanders can do to me that the cat o' nine tails ain’t already done.
IMF,S: Thank you for your time.
CR: I bid you good afternoon, Young Master Imfs! Now, I will go fishing with my friend Colin out on Black Lake.

Greetings, fellow citizens!

Today is “Black Friday”! Widely reputed to be the busiest shopping day of the year! And as someone in no way affiliated with the National Security Agency or “NSA”, I may or may not be using your tax dollars to ask you this helpful question: Have you considered buying a cell phone today?

Surely you’ve thought about the advantages that come from cell phone ownership! But I’d like to talk with you about the disadvantages that come from not owning a cell phone!

If you still don’t own a cell phone, you are effectively choosing to hide from your government! And the only question that may be asked of you is: why are you hiding? I can think of two possible reasons: 1) Your hair came out so badly this morning that you don’t want to the government spy satellites to locate you and see it, or 2) You are a criminal bent on overthrowing our increasingly hollow symbols of liberty. And the NSA may be able to see your hair (relax, it looks fine!), well, you get the picture.

To make it super easy, this Christmas we’re giving you the option of requesting a FREE cell phone from Santa Claus. To get your free cell phone, follow these simple instructions. The next time you are outside during daylight hours, simply bend down to tie your shoe. Take off your shoe, and stand up. Turn around three times and then bend down and put your shoe on again, and tie it.

By following these simple directions, it is highly probable that Santa Claus will deliver you a free Christmas cell phone. If you fail to do so, Santa might deliver something less to your liking.

Friends:

How did the name Prurience Mark Cavendish end up on the Terror Watch List?

I can only surmise that it is a plot by the terrorists themselves. They realized that their gravest threat was the unchecked power of the Good Book, and I suspect that somehow they got their unwashed Mahommedan hands on “P. M. Cavendish’s Conflagration!” or “P. M. Cavendish’s Pillar of Salt!” (available from little Lionel Sfarro-Soymie manning the table by the bulletin boards) and realized my "rhymes" quadrupled the potency of said Good Book!

Then, through an useful idiot (who may or may not have been Mrs. Carrington Bertram), they calumniated me to the good people of the Department of Homeland Security. Such are the wages of Patriotism in these troubled times!

You may ask, “Reverend Cavendish, do you resent being renditioned to Hungary with a bag over your head, and being subjected to degrading and inhumane treatment?”

To which I would answer that it was a privilege to wear that bag. I dub it a “freedom bag!” To clarify, I did not actually have to wear the bag, but would have done so proudly. And while I was proud to visit our Hungarian partners in the War on Terror, in the end, the matter was cleared up before leaving the Virginia-Washington metro area. Luckily, my old friend, Father Martin Kleptgelt, seems to have been contacted. He kindly exaggerated, telling them I was too incompetent and stupid to be a threat. For some reason, this characterization not only freed me, but seems to have paved the way for special favors in the US Capitol!

Instead of being renditioned, I ended up being hosted by a Mr Tony “Boom Boom” Carbonetti, a swarthy but well-behaved gentleman who seems to occupy a high but ill-defined role in the Washington security hierarchy. Mr. Carbonetti was kind enough to invite me to a meal aboard his schooner Liberty’s Pinch. On the whole I enjoyed the place, although his avant-garde photography – a mix of photos of Harry Reid, Jay Rockefeller, Charles Schumer, live boys, and dead girls – was a little too grainy for a Man of the Cloth like myself. But I was tickled to find that another old friend, “Pat” Marion “Blood Diamond” Robertson, was there. Marion and I go way back, in fact, I have a funny story about him, my first pony ride, a flaming ottoman, and Nanette Fabray. But that is all in the past, and I found that today we see eye to eye on quite a bit.

For example, I was cheered to hear Pat say that he felt “the overriding issue for the American people is the defense of our population from the blood lust of Islamic terrorists”.

To tell the truth, I always thought that Marion was phoning it on the subject of abortion. To say nothing of they way he followed up any mention of the Sermon on the Mount with his trademark high-pitched giggle. But when he’s talking about any kind of lust, I’ve always felt him to be deeply serious and authoritative, and all the more so when involves statements about religious zealots!

Marion, in turn, was touched by my Bible-based defence of the practice of waterboarding. So much so that I decided to make it the subject of today’s reading.

Naturally, using drowning against one’s enemies sounds cruel. But cast your mind back to when well-known gun patriot Charlton Heston parted the Red Sea and recall what the highlight of the movie was. Was it the thrill of victory (the parting of the sea)? Or was it the agony of defeat (the sea closing in on the Egyptians afterwards)? Ask yourself this same question about Hebrews 11:29:

By faith they passed through the Red sea as by dry land: which the Egyptians assaying to do were drowned.

You save the kicker for the end. First rule of sermonating. Q.E.D.

But if it were just this instance of a justified use of drowning, we might chalk it up to the well-known excesses of our brethren who wrote the Hebrew Scriptures in ignorance of the salvific example of Christ. But consider Matthew 18!

But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.

Indeed, not only does Christ argue that some offenders deserve what some liberals call “torture” but he goes on to pretty much command us to go whole hog! Consider Matthew 18:8-9:

Wherefore if thy hand or thy foot offend thee, cut them off, and cast them from thee: it is better for thee to enter into life halt or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into everlasting fire. And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: it is better for thee to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire.

An eye for an eye may make the whole world blind, but imagine a pile of eyes lying in the sun on the Guantanamo Beach – there’s an image guaranteed to make you sleep easier!

(Nota bene: It has been suggested that these passages are actually talking about disciplining oneself when one feels temptation. That is patently absurd. If one were to cut off the offending part of the body each time one felt temptation, one would soon be a bloody stump. Clearly Christ is talking about turning others into bloody stumps!)

These passages show that it is undubitable that God uses drowning, and so if he created man in his image, would it not be disloyal to disavow this practice?

Marion especially liked my reading of 18:8-9, a passage he reported to me was never one of his favorites. He even invited me down to Virginia Beach to give a lecture on the subject. It is nice to have a whole new set of friends. They say they are thinking of having me join the “campaign” – what campaign I’m sure will be revealed to me at a future date.

But in the meantime, the next time you hear someone criticizing waterboarding, ask them whether they would accuse Moses of war crimes?

And if they say yes, call them an anti-Semite.

AMEN.

Remember the legendary undergrowth of the Amazon? And the animals who used to live therein? Animals that have coexisted with mankind for millennium. Until now, when the rampant clear-cutting of the Brazilian is destroying the precious habitat these animals need to survive.
Now! See the critically acclaimed movie, “An Inconvenient Truce,” and discover the truth about a vanishing species.

Are you willing to help?

Image courtesy Ken from Ken's Kitchen

We, The Awards Committee, have been woefully remiss. But that doesn't mean things will be getting any better right away! It just means we're trying, and I hope that's enough. Perhaps together we can all heal and move forward.

Our beloved BTR3 is the latest honoree for comentation excellence at IMFB,S! and you can see a sampling of his work over there in 'The Sidebar.'

Also: Hellbound in Denver is added to the list of links, again over there in 'The Sidebar.'

Also also: there is some rampant Fafblog-Missing going on over at Crooked Timber. (Hat doff: IMFB,S! commentator a a.)

I woulda posted this sooner, but the power generator in the bunker died an we couldn't get it started again. Without any internet we just didn't know if it was safe to come out. But then, after we was sitting in the dark for days an days, Cousin Jack tries flippin the main breaker from the civil power grid back on. Zombies don't need electricity, so I guess electricity means it's probably safe to come out. We're gonna go take a look outside, but in case we don't make it I'm sending you this first.