no baster required

let's have a sunday night trifecta, why don't we? this one may be for the win:

fertilus maximus.

a 29-year old guy in tennessee has 21 children, with 11 different women. the kids range in age from infant to 11 years, so at least he wasn't banging it out of the park when he was underage. twice, two different years, he had 4 children within the year. he's not married to anybody and has a minimum wage job. his name was on the docket 11 times in ONE DAY last week, representing 15 kids in family court. by law, the state can only take 50% of his pay, but with his measly wage, when the pie is sliced up, some women get $2 a month. enfamil and underoos cost way more than that. none of the momz seem to work, so the state is footing the bill for this guy's extra loose and so-sloppy cannon.

he claims all the women *knew* that he was a baby factory. best quote? he didn't mean to have so many kids, "it just happened." people's stoopidity never ceases to amaze me, yet this guy continues to find women willing to go it bare-back with him? how desperate must be the lives of these women, that this guy seems promising? in any way? yes, he works and looks to have all his teeth, but c'mon? really? guy that already has 20 kids he doesn't support? that must be one magic schlong.

call my agent. i'm drawing a reality show where he and octo-mom go fierce at some sort of fertility death match...

maybe i need to stop reading the news and switch to reality tv. poor susan boyle, ya know?

my body and your satan

right outside my window, the sun is shining, it's warm and kids are throwing and catching balls. grown-ups are kicking them. couples are strolling, dogs are playing frisbee and the ice cream truck is going round and round. everybody living life, simply.

a few hours ago in wichita, dr. george tiller was shot to death in the lobby of his lutheran church. IN CHURCH.

dr. tiller was a family planning services doctor, and one of the few in the country who still performed late-term abortions. a few years ago, the religious right nutters were yakking and yakking about "partial birth abortions", which obviously sounds very upsetting. these are not mothers who *snap* and decide to terminate at the last minute. they are women confronted with a tragic decision, of a no longer viable baby, that could quite possibly kill or seriously injure them in the birth process. sometimes the fetus is horribly handicapped or already dead. these are lost children, sadly mourned by the women and families who must give them up.

his clinic offers funerary services, including photography, footprinting and handprinting, baptism, cremation, help for burial in or out of state, and arrangement for autopsy.

in 1986, his clinic was bombed. in 1991, it was blockaded for 6 weeks by operation rescue people. in 1993, he was shot in both arms as he left work. he and his family received regular death threats.

earlier this month, tiller had asked the fbi to investigate an incident where vandals cut wires to security cameras, cut holes in the roof and plugged downspouts, resulting in thousands of dollars in damage to the clinic.

now he is dead.

neal horsley, a devout born-again who is running for governor of georgia, maintains a website that publishes the home addresses of abortion doctors across the country. when one is killed a red line is drawn through his name.

randall terry: "George Tiller was a mass-murderer. We grieve for him that he did not have time to properly prepare his soul to face God. I am more concerned that the Obama Administration will use Tiller's killing to intimidate pro-lifers into surrendering our most effective rhetoric and actions. Abortion is still murder. And we still must call abortion by its proper name; murder. Those men and women who slaughter the unborn are murderers according to the Law of God. We must continue to expose them in our communities and peacefully protest them at their offices and homes, and yes, even their churches."

what are the men and women who harass, intimidate and attack patients and doctors? they are not pro-life. that phrase is meaningless. it's as banal as "support the troops". who the fuck doesn't? no, those people shouting and screaming outside of planned parenthood, those people making bombs and shooting guns are terrorists. domestic terrorists, attempting to legitimize and achieve their agenda through fear, and any means, lawful or no. they are not righteous, good OR christian in any sense of any of those words.

for a few years, i had a dentist whose office was in a medical building that had an abortion clinic in it also. in fact, it was where i got my abortion years before. going to get my teeth cleaned i had to run a gauntlet of hostility -- jeering and shouting, "baby-killer!' "jesus loves your baby!" "you will burn in hell for killing that baby!" it was terrifying. i got a new dentist. the town had to spend tens of thousands of dollars on extra police security. it was one of the clinics where john salvi opened fire in 1995.

abortion is legal in this country. it is a private and painful decision. i don't know anyone who was glib about terminating. that these loonies bookend their hate and violence with words of god makes me sick. if you want to carry out a pregnancy that may kill you, be my guest. do not attempt to force me to make my decision your way.

my heart aches for his family and their senseless loss. in fucking church.

sickening.

drink this

lmao, i'm thinking not so much... real product, available in the uk, formulated in some 21-year-old's bedroom. it's got mexican lime juice, italian grape juice, ginko biloba and guarana (which always make me think "guano", which is how all these things taste), and the company now has a staff of 10! woo-hoo! ad copy in italics:

The name Pussy shocks and demands attention - that's the point. if you need a can of pussy in your hand to be shocking, you should stay home and let somebody else take your space in the club.

Inhibition is a recipe for mediocrity. This is a premium energy drink named with confidence. nope, named by a wanker.

Pussy is spontaneous, entertaining, optimistic and fun. It’s a starting point. actually, it's an end point for most folks.

A moment when something happens and when things begin – Pussy starts conversations. It believes in having a good time as often as possible. the notion of my pussy being autonomous is just weird. and i'm thinking if a pussy starts conversations, most guys would prefer it just shut up and open wide.

Pussy is the first truly premium energy drink. We have sourced the best ingredients to create a great taste and a natural lift.

We believe in challenging the consensus – and moving things forward. Pussy is about natural energy, it’s irreverent, sophisticated and a pleasure to drink. Pussy is NOT about being serious, chemical energy, having a corporate attitude or being predictable. my pussy has never worn wingtips, for sure, but i do like its predictability, cuz it's always there when it's needed. i don't want it out on the town on its own.

i hate people today too.

foxy hate

jbohn2: f***in mexicans bet la raza is dancing around a hat over this one

Hugh_FL: Burrito anyone? What's that noise?

these are screen grabs from twitter feeds to fox news today, when it asked for viewer comments relating to obama's nomination of sonia sotomayer for the supreme court today. a woman from new york, whose parents came from puerto rico, not fucking mexico.

the possibility exists that some people were messing around and having one on, to see if they could get their stoopid racist comments on tv. whether they are pranking, or for realz, their stoopid racist comments were on tv. on the network more american people watch for news than any other.

what twisty sickening validation.

yeah, people make me sick today too.

behind closed doors

a report released in ireland this week details abuses in orphanages, reformatories and industrial schools run by the catholic church from the 1930's to the 1990's when the last of them were shuttered. the study took 9 years to complete, with much of that time spent being stymied by a lawsuit from the christian brothers, who ran most of the places. the lawsuit ultimately succeeded in its aim in keeping the names of the abusers unavailable. while i assume many of the guilty nuns and priests are dead, now nobody will be accountable, punished or shamed.

during the 60 years, over 30,000 children were sent to these homes. many were orphaned and starving. many came from abusive, alcoholic or neglectful homes. some had been borne out of wedlock. most were remanded against their parents' wishes by a powerful priest. it took decades for them to learn their true names and that their parents had tried to get them back but failed.

directly from the report, for the boys:

"Punching, flogging, assault and bodily attacks, hitting with the hand, kicking, ear pulling, hair pulling, head shaving, beating on the soles of the feet, burning, scalding, stabbing, severe beatings with or without clothes, being made to kneel and stand in fixed positions for lengthy periods, made to sleep outside overnight, being forced into cold or excessively hot baths and showers, hosed down with cold water before being beaten, beaten while hanging from hooks on the wall, being set upon by dogs, being restrained in order to be beaten, physical assaults by more than one person, and having objects thrown at them.”

also directly pasted, for the girls:

"Girls were routinely sexually abused, often by more than one person at a time, the report said, in “dormitories, schools, motor vehicles, bathrooms, staff bedrooms, churches, sacristies, fields, parlors, the residences of clergy, holiday locations and while with godparents and employers.”

the report details the passive collusion of the government, with the ireland ministry of schools conducting toothless inspections and declaring the dickensian conditions "just fine", year after year after year, with no outcry or repercussions.

here in the u.s. our scandals saw the light of day much sooner than those of our neighbor across the pond. clergy sodomy jokes became a regular gag on late night tv, so perhaps we are more jaded in thinking that "of course priests are kid-fuckers."

however, it has been a century since the catholic church held much power over u.s. irish catholics. the symbiotic nature of church and state in a place like ireland is difficult for many here to grasp. until the irish tiger set the economy on a fever pace, the power of the local parish was felt by families everyday, in all things.

try to imagine being a hungry little kid taken forcibly from your mom. try to imagine being at the mercy of nuns and priests who are being paid nothing, and given a pittance with which to run their school. their mercy and empathy shrivel and harden into resentment and disgust as they see countless huddled masses of stinking shoeless rags brought to the home for gruel and a pallet, month after month. try to imagine being that kid with nowhere to turn. try to imagine being that kid and instead of learning to read, being forced to string rosary beads 7 days a week, or do laundry by hand in giant boiling vats or make soap. try to imagine being that kid and having the only grown-ups in your life violate you in ways so degrading and so inhuman it kills you inside. try to imagine these fierce depraved men and women are servants of *god*. try to imagine being surrounded by other sad little kids suffering in the same ways.

midway through the investigation, in 2002, the catholic church in ireland agreed to pay $175 million to compensate victims of clergy sexual abuse. a separate group has paid out some $1.5 billion so far to more than 10,000 people who have claimed they were abused in state and church-run institutions.

the vatican has not issued a statement.

how much is childhood worth? what price innocence?

re-read the treatment quoted above suffered by the boys. sound familiar? these were the pictures at abu ghraib that so shocked the world. those violated were adults, wrongly or rightly apprehended in the name of war.

who was running the prison and who was running the catholic children's homes? low-level flunkies, who had nobody watching them.

people make me sick. and very very sad.

"power tends to corrupt. absolute power corrupts absolutely."

my 2 dads

99.9 %. i don't even think ivory soap is up that high, but this woman fell into that .1% nightmare.

at 11 months, her twins just didn't look alike. in my head, i'd think hey, whatever, fraternal twinsies, all that. yet for whatever reason this woman went for a dna test and got the surprise of her life.

Paternity tests then revealed what had happened - two eggs had been fertilized by two different sperm and there was a 99.99% chance the twins had different dads.

Doctors at the DNA lab in Dallas, Texas had never seen such a result. it has happened before, and it's been recorded, and there is a medical term: heteropaternal superfecundation.

the mother, mia washington said, "out of all people in america and of all people in the world, it had to happen to me, she told myfoxdfw.com. “i'm very shocked."

which translates to, "of all the sistahs who banged 2 different guys on the same day, ain't i gots the dumbest luck. now i guess i gots to go all up to county and tell jerome AND tyrone."

and ok, once again, did she want to be on the news for this? yo, yeah, i'm a ho.

republiclowns

with that whole "picture is worth a 1000 words" thing, i was tempted just to post this pic of michele bachmann to share, and let you all find your own layers. however, the story that ran alongside it, plus some other hilarity is too good to take a pass.

next week the republican national committee will hold an "extraordinary special session" (kinda like the x-games without the red bull for old white guys, i guess, or maybe they're trying to get in that "league of gentlemen") in which they will adopt a resolution renaming the democrats "the democrat socialist party". roger simon, writer for the blog "politico", asked this repub if that would force rnc chief michael steele to always call the dems that in speeches and such. when he's presumably in the hizzle. the guy's answer? "who cares?" way to stay in the game, dudes!

a congressman from georgia has offered up a bill to request that president obama declare 2010 "national year of the bible". a long windy breath of pompous heavenly air, his resolution includes this nugget:

"Whereas shared Biblical beliefs unified the colonists and gave our early leaders the wisdom to write the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States, both of which recognized the inherent worth, dignity, and inalienable rights of each individual, thus unifying a diverse people with the right to vote, and the freedoms of speech and vast religious freedoms..."

we'll take a safe bet that he and his co-sponsors (as well as any ignorant interns with keyboards and google) are unaware that many of the founding fathers considered themselves deists and agnostics. they were not thumping the bible at the constitutional convention. that little item about separating church and state, initiated by roger williams which helped get him, and a bunch of other dissenters, run out of town? the dark flip side of the salem witch trials -- with a minister as magistrate and most of the accused land-owning widows with property coveted by the towns? yeah. that.

ok, then, new faces!! while karl rove and dick cheney continue to slither onto talking head shows, trying to spin their legacy of evil and tyranny into "patriotism!" and "we kept you safe against terror! but you're doomed to a fiery apocalypse now, all-jihad in da house!!!", the gop is desperately flailing for a new face. so let's see who's out there... bobby jindal? first indian-american elected to a big office. harvard. rhodes scholar. if you saw even seconds of his rebuttal to obama's speech, he sounded like an idiot. with his state facing a $1.7 billion deficit, he wants to refuse the $4+ billion stimulus money portioned out to louisiana, because of "unspecified strings".

moving on. governor rick perry of texas wants to secede from the union because obama is a pinko-non-amurrican-socialist. also facing record deficits, he refused $550 million in surplus dough for his state's unemployment fund. at an april teabag rally ( can't resist, sorry), he said, "they're overturning the rights we had one by one, making choices that would leave our founding fathers scratching their heads." was he asleep for that whole patriot act thing?

charlie crist from florida. he of the dina lohan orange tan and a well-documented, closeted gay sex life. a moderate, married to a beard. it's only a matter of time before this blows up in a wide stance on gritty videotape in a public restroom or park.

mitt romney. handsome, telegenic and articulate, so he's got all that over the others. mormon. earth is 6000 years old. evolution = no way. he was a successful businessman, so i can't ever decide if he really believes that crap, or simply doesn't want to risk a split with his church. either way, his platforms are same old-same old.

what about the ladies? meghan mccain? john's 24-year old daughter, who has never held a job, never mind an elected office, twitters incessantly and sounds like an idiot whenever given a platform for public speaking. ( i have gay friends! srrrriously!) then again even with that whole verbal disability issue, palin was on the vp ticket.

speaking of, sarah palin and her passel of wasilla-billies just will not go away or shut up. her daughter, bristol, is now some kind of abstinence ambassador for a foundation sponsored by candies' shoes (!!! yes, really. just cuz you wear cheap slutty shoes, doesn't mean you should actually be cheap or slutty? or something.) the ny times interviewed some middle school girls where she made a speech, all of whom said she was basically full of shit and just saying what her mom told her say.

the above clown lady-- michele bachmann, the gay-hating, socialist-hunting, baby farmer from minnesota. awesomeness. she's scaring even the republicans. recently as a show of how open-minded or legit or who-knows-really-wtf, she's been pal-ing around with ron paul. yes. she's been reading "meltdown", which basically calls the new deal a failure and blames the federal reserve for the mess in which we are now mired. she's been attending weekly luncheons and this is a quote from somebody on paul's team:

"I had a feeling she'd have some interest in the book," said Woods, "because she asked some good questions. She was taking notes. She was asking if this or that point could be found in the book. I thought I recognized a sincere person who wanted knowledge, not the usual politician who couldn't care less about what the truth is and just wanted to propagandize."

she brought a pen! and paper! but if she was asking whether or not certain points could be found in the book, does that mean she didn't actually read it, or just didn't understand it? i'm guessing the latter, especially with the way she was trying to poke geitner about whether actions by the fed "could be found in the constitution"? which i'm guessing she's never read either.

polls on social issues show a big generational gap between voters closer in age to republican congressman (median 57) and those under 30. abortion and gay marriage are basically non-issues for the younger set. their attitude of "it's private, it doesn't affect me, why not?" is worlds away from the ultra-cons who seem to hog most of the air-time.

are the dems our saviors? of course not. i'm NOT an idiot, lol. but as long as illiterate wing nuts like palin get book contracts and tv appearances the repubs aren't offering any sort of viable option, are they? it would be interesting in my lifetime to see the demise of a political party and the rise of new other, at the very least.

stay tuned.

scaping the goats

a hooker got killed. please let's not pretend she was giving legit massages, because you don't offer that in the "erotic services" section of craigslist. you just don't.

hookers get killed. people get killed. but this particular hooker happened to be pretty and didn't look like some cracked-out ho. the med student who probably killed her was dumb as shit, leaving a trail a mile wide and bright red for the cops to easily track him down.

but somehow the story gets spun and everybody goes beserk at the founder of craiglist for allowing this sort of smutty networking to happen. for free. the same stuff that's been happening since the dawn of time. it simply moved from the back pages of the boston phoenix to on-line. just like selling your old waterbed or finding a room-mate. we all know nobody reads newspapers anymore, not even free ones like the phoenix.

unlike trying to score in a bar, or approaching a street-walker, a cl hook-up was a pretty sure thing. i have gay friends who do it on a regular basis, for the no-muss-no-fuss convenience. i've seen the ads with $$$$$ in the headers, so the pros were hiding in plain sight. every so often cops do a "sting" and net a few, which always struck me as shooting fish in a barrel. and really, aren't there meth labs or gang members that needed shaking up way more than a chick who saw no other income options? i mean, how desperate and cornered are these women?

facing likely frivolous, but assuredly annoying, lawsuits and media harassment craig newmark announced a change in cl policy today. the "erotic services" section will be phased out in a week. attorney generals in a few places crowed about this part! woo-hoo, we beat the dirty smut peddler! the truth is this: the name will be changed to "adult services". moderators will now oversee this section. it will no longer be free. so before, when hookers and johns went trolling, that was the only time money changed hands. but now? craigslist will be profiting from them! well done, media hysterics!

it's sad what happened to that girl. wrong place, wrong time. yet nobody is willing to call it just that. heads must roll and the print media hates craiglist for hijacking all that ad revenue. nobody tagged that med student the "hotel killer", did they?

sex-robatics

i'll put myself out on a limb, and guess that most folks don't think of sex in terms of getting hurt. that it's only enhanced by bruises, cuts, residual soreness and deranged girly bits.

while plenty of guys recoiled at my requests for a lil slap and tickle, i've been fortunate to meet a few like-minded souls. even better that the owner is one of them. he's deliberately inflicted some serious worlds of hurt. i have also been on the receiving end of unforeseen consequences that would terrify most and took months to completely heal. part of the playing field, as they say.

this one though? lol. he was only leaning on me. i felt and heard a snap. it was excruciating. like, dizzy for a few minutes, searing hot kinda pain. not broken, but not where that rib belongs at all.

a week later, it still hurts just to breathe.

who is luckier than me? i mean, i have lots and lots of ribs...

more animal follies

there is a zoo in kabul, afghanistan. we shall for now put aside the ethics of keeping animals in zoos, but i think we can all agree running a zoo is an expensive proposition. am i the only one thinking that comes the end of the week, there isn't always enough monkey chow to go around? maybe part of the entertainment enjoyed by the 10,000 visitors on a weekend is the animals eating each other.

in the kabul zoo, there is a pig. it is reportedly the only pig in the entire country and was a gift from china. (they couldn't pony up enough yuan to send two pigs? poor lonely piggy!) the pig is now in quarantine because some visitors expressed concern they might catch swine flu from it. the pig has never been to mexico. there are no direct flights from kabul to mexico. no one in afghanistan has swine flu, and i'll wager very few have ever been to mexico.

"For now the pig is under quarantine, we built it a room because of swine influenza," Aziz Gul Saqib, director of Kabul Zoo, told Reuters. "We've done this because people are worried about getting the flu."

so yes, people everywhere are stupid, but maybe his special pig room is nicer than where he was kept before with a bunch of scaredy muslims staring at him all day.

but wait...

so i clicked on the link because of the pig, but the ending of the story is what made my day:

Shabby and rundown, Kabul Zoo is a far cry from zoos in the developed world, but has nevertheless come a long way since it suffered on the front line of Afghanistan's 1992-4 civil war.

Mujahideen fighters then ate the deer and rabbits and shot dead the zoo's sole elephant. Shells shattered the aquarium.

One fighter climbed into the lion enclosure but was immediately killed by Marjan, the zoo's most famous inhabitant. The man's brother returned the next day and lobbed a hand grenade at the lion leaving him toothless and blind.

that's showin' him!

$5

five dollah.

hollah.

what can you get for five bucks? a beer at a bar. ( a decent 6-pack is around $7 or $8 now, i'm thinking) half a glass of wine or 30-40% of a martini. half a pizza. a family pack of chicken thighs. 2.5 rides on the mbta.

i'm sure at one point when dinosaurs still roamed the earth, it was my weekly allowance as a kid and i could buy some candy and maybe a few 45's with that. however in the nowy-times, it doesn't go all that far. although, last week at haymarket i only spent $5.50. granted i was still decently stocked from the week before, so didn't need much.

so why am i so pissed that the $5 yoga pants i have worn approximately 25 times in 5 weeks ripped?

money and me. i know -- completely irrational.

as they lay dying

from the washington post (yes, really, the washington post, not "the onion"):

"Corcoran College of Art and Design senior Lindsay Perkins said facing graduation from the Washington school has prompted her to focus more on her academics amid concerns an art degree will be worth little in a tightening nationwide economy.

"I feel like I have lost my motivation, because I don't know what to motivate myself to do next year," Perkins said."To some extent, I regret it. I don't know how to put it. I don't regret following my dreams, but maybe I regret the way I went about it. I didn't really set myself up for any place in society."

the article begins by saying, "at least one student..." was the reporter trying to pick this chick up in a bar? she was mooning over a pbr and he said, "why the long face?" and anyway, when was an art degree a segue into a real career? in the 50s or 60s? back when women couldn't get jobs in advertising anyway?

if i handed these anecdotal paragraphs into any of my journalism professors, i would have gotten an "f". hell, even a teaching assistant would have laughed in my face. where are the dreary jobless stats to reaffirm her angst? how much money have her parents tossed down the drain for their daughter's (now?) suddenly worthless degree ? has there been a trend of art majors switching degree programs? are art school apps down? transfers up? what, man?

or, haha, maybe they had white space from unsold ad spots and needed filler? "where's that crap bit from so-&-so about the arty chick? make it less than 100 words!"

in a separate but related note, the bleeding red ink ny times and its hemorrhaging daughter, the boston globe, remain in negotiations. however, at 11 p.m. sunday, after beating its head against the wall for weeks, the nyt handed the unions a copy of the federally-mandated notice it plans to file monday morning, stating that the paper will close in 60 days. in other words, "yes, we really fucking mean it. we will shut down this paper and you are all screwed. now pony up."

the globe is projected to lose $85 million this year. ad revenue in the 1st 3 months of 2009 are down 30% over last year. the nyt is seeking $20 million in cuts from the unions, half of which they want to slice from the boston newspaper guild. the major sticking point? lifetime job guarantees. yes. they actually still exist and 450 staff at the globe have them. are you fucking kidding me? i find this extra ironic (is that possible?) because massachusetts is a right-to-work state. employers can fire staff without stated cause. in fact, that's become a more popular option when the ax falls, because it's less likely to open the door for a wrongful termination suit.

i'm too lazy now to look for the link, but there was a story last week that a chicago paper had its reporters coming in (unpaid) on weekends to surf the net on sites like "tmz", "the smoking gun" and "perez hilton". they had to then get "wrap-up" stories ready for monday's edition. stories that were already in circulation, and were as many as 4 days old. the editor who brainstormed this drudgery apparently didn't seem to realize that the people he was looking to add into his paper's circulation numbers have already read these stories ON THE NET.

i just keep hearing this bit in my head:

DEAD PERSON:I'm not dead!
CART MASTER:'Ere. He says he's not dead!
CUSTOMER:Yes, he is.
DEAD PERSON:I'm not!
CART MASTER:He isn't?
CUSTOMER:Well, he will be soon. He's very ill.
DEAD PERSON:I'm getting better!
CUSTOMER:No, you're not. You'll be stone dead in a moment.
CART MASTER:Oh, I can't take him like that. It's against regulations.
DEAD PERSON:I don't want to go on the cart!
CUSTOMER:Oh, don't be such a baby.