Obscanity: You'll know it when you see it

Is this really what you want as your next Vice President? Doesn’t the White House deserve more respect and seriousness? Honestly. This was around the same time (1984) that Barack Obama was working for the New York Public Interest Research Group and then doing some of his “community organizing” in Chicago – in clothes, not in swimming trunks.

I laughed SO HARD when I watched the SNL sketch, largely because once Tina-Sarah started talking, I recognized that a HUGE portion of what she was saying was a nearly-verbatim recreation of Palin’s actual interview answers, especially once they got into the substance of it.

YouTube – CNN Laughs It Up Over Sarah Palin Interview.

Did John McCain call Barack Obama’s argument horseshit on national television? My friend sent me this video and although I didn’t notice it during the actual debate, now that I listen again, it sure sounds like it!

You decide!

I was watching that last video and after seeing the montage of “Charlie” this and “Charlie” that, I thought it would be hilarious if somebody made some sort of parody using the Charlie the Unicorn cartoon. Well, apparently somebody beat me to it – take a look!

Sarah Palin’s Interview: It’s just over this bridge, Charlie!.

YouTube – Facts: Sarah Palin is Stupid.

My favorites:

“I can see right into the headquarters of Chase Bank from my office, so on the Sarah Palin scale, that makes me Alan Greenspan…”

“Gibson asked, ‘Have you ever given any kind of command decision to the Alaskan National Guard?’ Palin answered, ‘We have called up National Guardsmen to help in other states who have gone in emergency status. We have assisted there.’ False. Governor Palin has never issued an order to the Alaskan National Guard. Know what else she has not done to our knowledge? Properly pronounced the word ‘nuclear.'”

OH DEAR GOD. She’s a “nukular” girl! Bloody hell. I hadn’t realized until watching this video. This is pure treasure, I swear. You need to watch it.

YouTube – Jack Cafferty slams Sarah Palin!. Visit Cafferty’s blog entry for a transcript. Spend a couple of minutes reading people’s comments on this entry – thankfully most of them are intelligent comments, but there are a few that are just completely off the wall.

But bear in mind… she may just be working hard to lower expectations before the debate, so that if she just gets through without fucking up, people will say she won.

Wow. John McCain’s campaign has been putting out some pretty desperate ads, but this one just takes the cake.

This ad pretty much crystallizes one of the key differences between Republican and Democratic thinking, at least in the present climate of divisive politics. Democrats – or at least, the kind of Democrats who support Obama – recognize that for any given issue, there is a black, and there is a white, but there are also countless shades of gray, and typically the truth falls somewhere in that ambiguous area. Not always, of course, but when it comes to certain issues, you cannot simply boil it down to a Right and a Wrong. After all, as they say in “Wicked,” “There are precious few at ease with moral ambiguities, and so we act as though they don’t exist!”

On the other hand, for many Republicans, especially the knee-jerk Republicans we seem to see as mainstream candidates these days, there is only a Right and a Wrong, and a Yes and a No, and if you even pause to THINK about the complexity of the issue, or about the space between Yes and No, then you are part of the No. They don’t understand that you can be right AND wrong. They don’t understand that two people can agree about a problem and disagree about a solution.

For a Democrat like Obama, it would seem natural, in a debate, to acknowledge when the opponent is right about certain things, and follow up with an explanation of why their interpretation of those things is still not the best, why some of the details are wrong, why something has been mischaracterized, or why they disagree with the solution to fixing those things, if they’re broken. For Obama to say, “John is right, but…” or “John is right, and we agree on that issue…” seems perfectly natural to us.

For the kind of Republicans who patched this ad together, this is a sign of weakness. The willingness to recognize the skill or knowledge of your opponent makes you a bad leader, in their eyes. Cooperation is weakness. Diplomacy is weakness. Mediation is weakness. Politeness is weakness. To them, you have to be a pit bull in lipstick. You can’t work things out; you have to WIN, at any cost. To them, there is a right, and there is a wrong, and for every Good Guy, there is a Bad Guy. There can’t be two Good Guys who are just different. One of them has to be Bad. And it’s true that sometimes this is the case – but sometimes you’re just talking about two people who want to do good but disagree on the meaning of “good,” or two people who want to fix the same problem but have very different solutions.

This is setting aside the reality that every single one of Obama’s acknowledgments of McCain’s accuracy on a point was followed by a “but,” which was meticulously edited out by the commercial’s creators. Never mind that it mischaracterizes Obama’s opinion of McCain’s beliefs and strategies (and tactics) and completely ignores that he had a strong rebuttal for each point. As far as I’m concerned, that is the obvious problem with the ad, and I don’t think people will fall for it. Not most people, anyway. For me, more problematic is the implication of the ad itself – that to them, the very fact that he was willing to concede a single inch, or say something positive about McCain, even just acknowledge that McCain is at all informed or intelligent or, you know, a human being, makes him a failure and serves as proof of his inability to lead. For them, if Obama acknowledges that McCain is right about one thing, it necessarily follows that 1) McCain is right about all things, and 2) Obama is wrong about all things.

I think that says a lot about what kind of administration McCain would run. It’s pretty much the same administration Bush ran – you’re either with us, or you’re against us. You’re either Christian, or you’re going to hell. You want every zygote to turn into a human, or else you’re a raving baby-murderer. You either support the nuclear family, or you’re a child molester who wants to undermine society and demolish the institution of marriage or marry your pet goat. If you aren’t a conservative, then you’re a radical left winger. You can either put complete and utter faith in the free market, or you can fess up to being a rabid socialist. You’re a blind supporter of US policy, or you’re a terrorist. You’re either a Republican, or you hate your country. If you try to reach over to the other side… you are weak. Oh, and you hate your country.

This most recent ad proves that John McCain will bring more of the same. After all, he’s John McCain, and he approves of this message.

As you probably already know, yesterday John McCain cancelled his appearance on David Letterman’s CBS late night talk show, claiming that he had to rush back to Washington because the economy was about to crater. Letterman was informed that McCain was rushing off to the airport and was about to board a plane immediately.

Well, about six and a half minutes into this video, you’ll see where McCain really had to go. Well, it turns out that while he was supposed to be on a plane, McCain was having his nose powdered on the set of Katie Couric’s CBS Evening News. Does he think nobody is going to catch him? Seriously? I mean, this is all on camera. In the public eye. What, Letterman just wasn’t going to notice the national broadcast? From the same building???

Of course, the benefit to McCain is that while some of us may see right through this blatant transparency, I guarantee you that the rightwing defense will be, “So what? Letterman isn’t important; the economy is!” To which the correct response is, of course, and now, which is more important, Katie Couric, or the economy? Because McCain put one of these first yesterday, and it wasn’t the economy.

The first couple minutes are not the main point, so if you are pressed for time, skip the intro and the praise for McCain’s war service, and start at 2:22. Or if you’re REALLY pressed for time, skip to 6:35, when things get really interesting. (But if you can, just watch the whole clip.)

McCain bails on Letterman

YouTube – John McCain’s ads are LIES. Here’s the video proof..

If you think we’re not headed toward a police state with no constitutional rights… you NEED to watch this:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

“And I can see Russia from my house!” (I <3 Tina Fey) Listen to that tone in his voice. "I don't know how to answer this question without looking like an idiot for picking her, so I'm just going to whiiiiiine about Obama and hope I get away with it." And then, petulantly, he answers when pressed - with a supremely idiotic answer.

YouTube – John McCain stumbles on Palin’s National Security Experience.

Another great video, this one from TheRealMcCain.com – more specifically, from Robert Greenwald at Brave New Films, creators of the amazing film, Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price

This great “Commander In Chief Test” video is definitely worth watching. I particularly like the bit about getting Bush re-elected. I think that little clip should be played on every network television station across America. Multiple times.

This awesome story is making the rounds on the Internet and in the news lately.

In 1969, Anthony “Ace” Bourke and John Rendall rescued a lion cub from the “exotic animals” department at Harrod’s Department Store in London. They named him “Christian” and raised him in their apartment, exercising the cub on the grounds of the local church. After a year, though, Christian the lion became too large to keep in their home.

As luck would have it, the two men coincidentally ran into actors Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna, who had recently starred in Born Free, the 1966 film about another domesticated lion who had been reintroduced into the wild by the couple whom the actors had portrayed, George and Joy Adamson (author of Born Free: A Lioness of Two Worlds). They suggested that the two men contact George Adamson in Kenya.

Bourke and Rendall eventually brought the lion to Kenya, and after a few years, they returned to visit him. They were informed at that point that Christian was the leader of his own pride and was fully wild now, and that he would not remember them. See for yourself what really happened when the lion and the men met again.

You can purchase the DVD made about Christian the lion at the Born Free Foundation website.

Did John McCain call his wife a cunt? Maybe, or maybe not. I still think it’s interesting that the question was asked flat out and he conveniently didn’t deny it. In fact he got on his high horse about “that kind of language.” Of course… whether he said it that particular time or not, it’d be hard for him to deny he’s ever used the word, considering this fabulous Freudian slip… because honestly, how often do we accidentally slip and say words that aren’t already in our general lexicon? Methinks the good senator had cunts on the brain.

[Cross-posted at my epinions account.]

We have friends over fairly often, and the game of Cranium is definitely one of our favorites to bring out. The game is terrific because it relies on teamwork and a variety of creative and intellectual tasks.

This is no “Candy Land“; if you want to win, you’re going to have to use your… cranium, as it were. You can get the basic board rules from the game’s instructions; the more important information you need to know is about the different tasks you could be assigned.

The Basic Stuff

Each space on the Cranium game board is marked with a color, either red, blue, green or yellow. At the four “corners” of the gameboard (actually located in the middle of each side) is a purple “brain.”. Regardless of how many spaces a player is supposed to move, they must stop when they reach each brain, even if their roll would have taken them further. Between each “brain” spot is an inside track and an outside track; the inside track has fewer spaces, so you get to the next brain more quickly. The team that goes first is the team including the player with the next birthday. I’m not kidding; this is in the rules!

At the start of the game, every player is on the initial “brain” spot, and therefore they get to pick their first task. If they are successful in their first task, they get to roll the dice and move to the appropriate color via the inside track, and on their next turn, they will draw a card from the deck of this color. If they do not succeed in their first task, their turn is over. When they do successfully complete a task, they must go along the outside track until they reach the next brain. The inside-outside path resets at each brain, so you can still catch up even if you miss your first challenge.

Once you’ve made your way around the board, you enter the center “brain” – the big brain, if you will, and you must answer, on each of your subsequent turns, a question from each of the four categories. Once you finish the fourth, you move to the middle of the brain, and on your next turn, all of the other teams get to pick a card for you. That’s all of the teams, not each of the teams. They will have to agree on a category. Usually this category is red (Data Head), unless your team includes one of those people who just knows everything about everything. In order to win, your team must successfully complete this last task.

So What Are These Challenges?

The game’s challenges are broken up into four key categories: Word Worm (yellow), Creative Cat (blue), Data Head (red), and Star Performer (green).

Yellow is “Word Worm,” and contains such wacky tasks as:

• Gnilleps: One player from the team must correctly spell a word backwards on your first attempt, and without writing anything down.

• Spellbound: The same as Gnilleps, only you get to spell it the normal way!
• Zelpuz: The team must unscramble words using a very vague clue.
• Lexicon: Multiple choice definitions. Be careful – these aren’t SAT questions. Here, they ARE trying to trick you; watch out for homonyms, because inevitably both words’ definitions will be potential answers
• Blankout: These are the hardest; you must complete a word with letters whited out. You do get a clue, but the clues usually aren’t too helpful.

Green, “Star Performer,” is my favorite; it involves various physical performance skills, including:

• Humdinger: One team member must hum the song on the card, while the other members attempt to guess the song. Generally when we play, we allow the team member to hand over the card to another teammate if she doesn’t know the song; she is forbidden to guess. If no player knows the song, then we allow them to pick another card.

• Cameo: Basically, charades. In theory, you’re not supposed to be allowed to give any indication of how many words or whether your team is on the right track, but we generally just follow the rules of charades instead.
• Copycat: The performing team member must get her teammates to guess which famous person she is imitating by mimicking the person’s speech, actions, characteristics. No names of people or places are permitted, and the team member cannot respond to anything the guessers ask. This challenge can either be really boring or absolutely hilarious, depending on how strictly you adhere to the rules. Given “Elvis Presley,” some people will say something boring like, “I have left the building,” or “Thank you very much.” More creative performances will involve hip thrusting and curled lips. It’s up to the game’s players to decide what they will and will not allow here.

Blue, “Creative Cat,” is my other favorite; it involves artistic tasks such as:

• Cloodle: Basically, Pictionary.

• Sensosketch: Like Cloodle, except that the drawer’s eyes must be shut. This can be extremely entertaining, and I like to hold on to the most brilliant “Cloodle” masterpieces for reminiscing in future games. If you do this, you might want to label it after the turn is over; some of them will be pretty unrecognizable later on!
• Sculptorades: The player has to translate the answer into sculpted form. No gestures/acting/pointing is allowed; this isn’t charades!

Red, “Data Head,” is my least favorite, although some people are freakishly good at this. The tasks include:

• Factoid: Random trivia questions. No list to choose from. These can be ridiculously hard.

• Selectaquest: Trivia, but with multiple choice answers.
• Polygraph: True or false trivia. The logical answer is rarely the actual answer.

Things You Should Know

• Sculptorades: We need to get a jar of Play-Dough; the Hints: Generally in “Star Performer” and “Creative Cat” you will have to rely on hints in order to give you some context as to what the answer might be. However, we find that sometimes

  As you can see, this game can be a lot of fun, and as in other popular board games like “Monopoly” and “LIFE,” you’ll probably find yourself modifying the rules as you go along. This can be the most fun part! After all, by tweaking it, you make it your own. 🙂