So You Say This Is (War On) Christmas (REPOST)

I just saw this today. Predictable. Fundie Christians. They run the fucking country and their self-image is so wrapped up in persecution they have to invent it where it doesn't exist.

So I'm reposting...but first, some context. This was written in December 2007, so there's references to all the various candidates (of which Obama emerged victorious, thank Bog) including the always good for an amusing Ayn Rand soundbite, Ron Paul.

Let's start with this. As an Ex-military guy, if you say "War On..." I feel that I need to see bodies. If you can't show me the bodies, you can't call it a war. The "War on Drugs" at least qualifies due in no small part to trigger happy cops. The "War On Christmas"...unless there has been a rash of drive-bys on Mall Santas that has gone mysteriously unreported...not so much.

So, as Rogers points on in the excellent post I Saw You Looking At Agnosticism's Ass, Christianity and Christians have been acting awfully needy lately. Co-dependant clingy needy. "Girlfriend you're really starting to think about dumping, if only because of all the neediness," needy.

Now, and work with me here, EVERY major candidate for President and the vast, vast majority of the MINOR ones...the ones who can say whatever the fuck pops into their pointy little heads because it just doesn't matter (I'm looking at you, Ron "Fiat Money" Paul)...spend a considerable amount of time dry humping an altar somewhere hoping that a photographer will come by and take a picture of them fellating the Jesus on a Cross so that they can establish their "Good Christian" bona fides. Somehow, I just don't think your average Atlanta-area Megachurch-goer is in all that much danger of having the place raided by preatorians and getting their asses thrown into the gladiatorial pits.

So why "War On Christmas"? Well, we can start with the rise of Faux News, who needed to fill 24 hours a day with conservative friendly drool. Telling people that they're wonderful because they hate taxes only lasts so long. A producer looking to hand red meat to the right wings can't help but notice that, first, despite the power they wield they LOVE to feel sorry for themselves, and second, a shitload of them self-identify as good Christian Churchgoers.

So once again, I have to sit here and listen to this self-righteous drivel from folks who reply to "Happy Holidays" with a pointed "Merry Christmas". Hey, asshole, if you wanted to SAY "Fuck You" at least have the balls to actually say it. I say Happy Holidays interchangeably with Merry Christmas (more on that later) for one reason ONLY. I am a LAZY asshole. "Happy Holidays" is just easier than "Merry Christmas, Happy Channukah, Happy New Year and a very festive crapload of minor holidays centered around the Winter Solstice for some suspicious reason."

Which leads me to why I, a notorious agnostic (what can I say, it's a really cute ass), have no problem with Merry Christmas. You want "war on christmas"? Here it comes. As far as I'm concerned "Christmas" is just the latest name for the Solstice Holiday, and any excuse to get together with family and eat myself round is a Good Thing (cf., Thanksgiving), but the lewt is bonus. Plus it's nice to be reminded that while there is two more months of snow and sleet and all other manner of white shit followed by a month of freaking mud and dirty slush, there will in fact be another summer. You've gotten your crappy religion all over my tasty solstice celebration.

Everyone is pretty certain that Christmas is simply the heir of the Saturnalia and various other pagan festivals. Let me suggest something FAR MORE subversive: Easter and Passover have their roots in pagan rebirth and renewal legends and celebrations. Christ is Dead, Christ Is Risen? The sparing of the Jews from Matt Damon...I mean the Angel of Death? Pretty standard really. Judaism isn't even unique in it's insistence that there is only one god.

You want war? The central tenets of your faith are eminently predictable sequalae of preceding cultural beliefs. Happy Holidays.

I Just Don't Know What To Say...Oh, Wait, I Do...

MSNBC.com First Read on Friday had a post on the Unemployment numbers entitled "Liberal Blog Buzz, More on jobs #s".

Who did they list as the "liberal blogs"?

Andrew Sullivan. And then...

Megan McArdle. The woman who started blogging under the pseudonym "Jane Galt".

Jesus fucking Christ. Next I expect to see, "From the left leaning Cato Institute," from these brain fucking dead uber-moron mouthbreathers. That anybody is paid to produce information so misleading is infuriating. Now, Sullivan is at least not a right-winger. But he fucking well describes himself as conservative. McArdle, on the other fucking hand, has spilled so many pixels justifying her preconceived glibertarian positions with made up data that she might as well have been Karl Rove's enlarged prostate. Fuck me!

You want to know why America is so fucked up? Because too goddamned many people rely on these (and similar) twits for information. You might as well consult as a Magic Fucking Eight Ball for info...it might occasionally actually be right. Unlike these utter wastes of what would otherwise be useful proteins and amino acids.

I Will Only Say This Once

Catholic bishops would be well advised to pay considerably more attention to where the priesthood are putting their dicks than where they're putting communion wafers.

Half A Loaf

With regard to the current health care bill, I am sympathetic to frustration with the current process. Although misattributed to Bismarck, the quote, "Laws, like sausages, cease to inspire respect in proportion as we know how they are made," remains accurate. Would I prefer something else, with a robust single payer option, or even better something that freezes out insurance companies entirely? Yes. It is morally vile to make money off of human suffering and that is exactly what a stockholder in a health insurance company does.

This is unhelpful however. Though I'd love single payer, Steve Benen and Ezra Klein are right: Failure of this bill now does NOT increase the likelihood of a better bill (from my perspective), unless I am willing to grit my teeth and let the situation become utterly intolerable (or as a Marxian would have it, "Until the dialectic becomes obvious to the proletariat,").

Since the dialectic ain't gonna be obvious until you have LOTS of bodies piling up in a way directly attributable to bad health insurance coverage, and since I think that pile will be like an iceberg, most of it out of view, I cannot muster the cold bloodedness necessary to let thousands or millions die simply in order to stick it to insurance companies.

The current bill is far from perfect. The current bill is far from adequate, in point of fact. But it is more adequate than the status quo, and furthermore, it inserts into the public discourse the concept that health care, however inadequate to the actual need, however constrained by people's misinterpretation about what their personal Magic Sky Fairy wants from us, that Health Care is a right and not a privilege to be given or withheld at the whim of an employer or our economic status. We can build from that. We can't, no matter how much we think we ought to be able to, build from the wreckage of the current bill. Our pursuit of purity is why we have the current inadequate bill. It will only get inadequater if we scrap this one.

Better half a loaf and the principle that bread is a human right to a false sense that we'll get better bread if we drop the current version in a ditch and simply push harder later for a nice crusty sourdough.

Why Am I Not Surprised...

That the Deciderator's NASA allowed the one satellite monitoring global warming to slowly die?

Step 1: Deny there's a problem, based on lack of data.
Step 2: Claim the science is muddled.
Step 3: Deny funding to any hardware or studies that might unmuddle the science.
Step 4: Deny there's a problem, based on lack of data.

They do this with medical marijuana as well.

Because Some Things Should Be Offered With No Further Comment

Officials Warn Against Hoarding Manure.

I've Blogged Before, And I'll Blog Again...

About guns.

Full Disclosure, I own, but am not currently in possession of, a 9mm Handgun, a .30-30 Rifle and a 12 Ga Shotgun (the Wee Pedant being who she is, I'm inclined to require unlocking procedures akin to nuclear weapons release before I bring them into my home). Having said that, I am highly ambivalent about unlimited gun rights.

Maybe I've run too many ranges, but the vast majority of my fellow citizens have no more business possessing firearms than they do possessing crystal meth. Too much potential for misuse. Allow a liberal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment and eventually someone's kid blows his own head off. And now this.

Apparently open carry leads to, shall we say, serious consequences.

Soccer mom in Pennsylvania horrified fellow soccer moms by openly carrying a holstered pistol to a soccer game. She had her carry permit revoked then reinstated 8 days later. She's dead now, in an apparent murder/suicide at which her three children (now orphans) were present. Domestic dispute.

Which leads to my point. I will emphasize this for the "Guns don't kill people, people kill people," folks out there. The presence of a gun in any highly emotional situation immediately raises the stakes to life and death. Instantly. Am I saying that the gun in this caused the violence? No. Did the gun make it lethal? You are fucking-A right it did. Were her fellow soccer game attendees unreasonable in being worried (batshit upset, more like) at someone carrying a gun to events that time and again in this country devolve into shouting matches or violence between coaches, refs and parents? Abso-fucking-lutely not.

So let's be honest about the bargain we make when we interpret the 2nd Amendment the way we've decided to. We are arguing for MORE accidental or spur of the moment homicides. Look at that chart again (or for the first time). Other than the District of Columbia (a special case...if you carved out any poverty stricken zone that compact in this country, you'd get that result), the top ten per capita (corrected for population size, in other words) firearms death states you get in order are Alaska, Louisiana, Wyoming, Arizona, Nevada, Mississippi, New Mexico, Arkansas, and Alabama.

(Bitter Sarcasm) Clearly the strong gun control laws in those states has led to poor defenseless citizens gunned down by rampant crime. (/Bitter Sarcasm)

As it turns out there's a high correlation between a shitload of guns, and a shitload of gun deaths. As Eddie Izzard says, "And the National Rifle Association says that, 'Guns don't kill people, people do,' but I think the gun helps, you know? I think it helps. I just think just standing there going, 'Bang!' That's not going to kill too many people, is it? You'd have to be really dodgy on the heart to have that…”.

So I own guns. I enjoy firing guns. I am comfortable around guns (the Army saw to that). But I DON'T FUCKING KID MYSELF about the implications of the firearms culture in this country. More people die because of it. Period. Either own up to it, or give up your guns, damnit. Quit blowing sunshine up your own ass about what you're doing...