The Case for Obama

With the caucuses (cauci?) only a few days away, we figured we'd better make our endorsement official. Our reasoning is as follows:

1. Hey, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy...

(Editor's note-- wait a minute-- we don't want to plagiarize Joe Biden (of all people). Let us give it another shot-- we promise not to use the word "articulate")

1. Comes in without baggage or allegiances (read: no fathers/husbands to avenge, family legacies to polish, Vietnam War experiences/lack thereof to explain, Civil Rights experiences to retaliate for)

2. Admitted he inhaled because "that was the point."

3. Best arguments are the ones most criticized (would talk to enemies, would care for victims of terrorism before bombing random Arab country).

4. His obligatory follow-ups in which he is forced to say that he would bomb some country into sand in retaliation can be taken as just that, and not as his "gut reaction."

5. Only major Democrat with any credibility on the War in Iraq, having opposed it from the beginning.

6. His face alone would send a huge message to the rest of the world about who/what America is (and isn't).

7. His name might further confuse terrorists.

8. Doesn't come across as a used-car salesman

9. Presumably his haircuts cost less than $400 (see above)

10. Doesn't sound like Suze Orman (read: doesn't shout at you... unless the vibe calls for it)

(also see above)

11. That Monday Night Football ad (DUN-DUN-DUN!), and the fact that he only roots for one city.

12. Has got "game," at least according to the Sports Illustrated columnist over whom he drained a jumper after being told it was "for the presidency."


Oh, and the fact that as a black man, believe it or not, he bears a better chance of winning the undecideds/independents than a woman who is disdained by women who make the cookies... and those who disdain them for it, and a white Southerner who has reinvented himself as a populist taking on Wall Street... while living in a 28,000-square-foot mansion.

(Editor's note-- We do realize that our values might not coincide with those of the average Iowan...)

Pondering Pakistan

Well, the powder keg is starting to explode. Benazhir Bhutto has been shot and/or blown up (order not yet determined). We are not proud of our initial reaction, which took on a decidedly neo-con bent: That these motherf***ers are crazy and that maybe more extreme and draconian measures are called for (although we will stop short of saying that "it's Giuliani time"). Come to think of it, this plays right into Musharraf's hands-- he gets to get rid of one political opponent, and use it as fodder against the others. One has to wonder how hard he was trying to protect her.

It also made us question why, after ten years of relative comfort in England, one would want to come back to a place where one could be exchanged for 72 virgins at any moment.

(We understand that whole "pull-of-home" concept, but had a hard time just showing up for Christmas.)

Could parallels be made with the tiger mauling in San Francisco, especially with the speculation that the deceased may have taunted the tiger by dangling his leg over the fence?

(Editor's note-- We almost scooped the NY Times (they just updated their headlines))

Happy Boxing Day!

Do they know it's Christmas time at all?

Uh, no, Bob... matter o' fact, a large number of them ain't even Christians!

Welcome back to the 1/3 world...

that is NYC aka Nueva York, the perfect place to make the transition from the developing world to the (supposedly) developed one.

Fitting Finale

Added to graffiti on the walls of Cien Puertas:

Last day in Guate
[We] tore this motherf***er up!
--[HM] 12/19/07

Communing with Che

... over beers in El Portal, where Señor Guevara used to knock back a pint or two.

You gots to go with the "Moza."


items adorning the bar:

Che mug (on mug)

Che 3 peso(?) bill

Oversized bottles of Johnnie Walker (Red and Black)

Glass shaped like boot

Mug shaped like breast

Statue of dog screwing man (with moving phallus)

¡Viva la revolucion!

Feedin' Time

Belizability

Greetings from Belize, where they speak English... We've forgotten how nice it is to be able to express ourselves. We've realized the past 2 months we have been living essentially as a retarded person, if you'll excuse the political incorrectness.

Swam with sharks, stingrays, and turtles today, due to take to the high seas by sail in 2 days... hopefully the weather will be good enough to go. Land ho! (no offense)

BURN,

MOTHER-

F***ER,

BURN

What's the Latin root for "big-ass"?

Jungle Fever

Tomorrow, we, possibly being of unsound mind and/or body, will venture forth into the jungle of northern Peten, Guatemala, in search of El Mirador, the first and largest city-state of the Maya and one of the largest centers in all of Mesoamerica. Among the vast ruins lies the highest pyramid in the Americas, and possibly the entire world. This journey, since we chose to accept it, will involve 5 days of slogging through mud that is apparently up to knee-deep-- between the blisters from the rubber boots we will have to wear and the inevitable bug and insect bites we will have to endure, let's just say that it's a good thing that it'll be pant and shoe season when we return to the States. But fear not, dear readers, as we will be accompanied by 3 Germans, one of whom we saw in something today that resembled a Boy Scout uniform. Oh, and a guide or two. We will also be taking our malaria pills, hammock (with proper netting, we can only hope), and trusty camoflauged flashlight, not to mention our reporter's notebook and digital camera.

Afterwards, we shall return to Flores, an island in Lake Peten Itza where the Tayasal Maya held out against the conquistadoring Spaniards all the way until 1697. Then it will be onto Tikal, which, while not as old or as large as El Mirador, has a slightly better team of groundskeepers. After this Mayan oddysey, we plan to head straight to the beaches of Belize for some R&R, and S&S&S&S (sun & surf & snorkeling & sailing-- we will have hopefully left the "M" in the jungle) down the coast of Belize, where the showers are hot and you can flush the toilet paper down the toilet. That´s what sold us on it, anyway.

Over and occasionally down, but not out...

(Editor's note-- for security reasons, we could only publish this missive AFTER our correspondent had emerged from the jungle)

Fixer-Upper

Somewhere, a cereal box is missing its mascot

Monkey See, Monkey Do

... and then a Zeitgeist will fly out of our ass

OK, we just saw the "documentary" "Zeitgeist" we'd been hearing about, in a hostel in... an undisclosed location. The religion part made a fair amount of sense, but then part 2 went straight into 9/11 conspiracy theories, which in our mind are precisely the same as religion... YOU ARE ASKING US TO BELIEVE YOUR CONSPIRACY IF WE CANNOT PROVIDE PROOF THAT IT DID NOT HAPPEN, EVEN THOUGH THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO PROOF THAT IT DID.

We are fully ready to believe that conspiracies exist, especially within the current government, but these must be taken hand-in-hand with something else that should never be underestimated... GOVERNMENT INCOMPETENCE. Given a choice, we will generally run with the latter.

The 3rd installment, on the National Bank/ Federal Reserve/ Wealthy Elite Conspiracy, we were also fully prepared to believe, but it's hard to take the words of a raving lunatic and a narrator who doesn't seem capable of proper noun-verb agreement seriously. And William Jennings had a last name... Bryan. I thought he was the last one to argue for a gold standard, and even he was willing to include silver.

And finally, the "talk-u-mentary" links all the US wars together as premediated manipulated acts of aggression with the help of, uh, premediated manipulated choices of words and facts. It states that World War I began "shortly after" the sinking of the Lusitania, citing this as the sole cause of the war, despite the fact that it happened ABOUT 2 YEARS BEFORE war was declared. There were a few other factors that occured after, such as the Zimmerman Telegram (look it up), not to mention the resumption of U-boat activity, that played a larger role.

As for WWII, yes, the US should realize that it had pushed Japan into a corner, but it is rather convenient to fall back on "international law" on this one, and ignore what was actually going on. And if you think the governmant would be jaded enough to allow thousands of its citizens to die purely to instigate war and profits, you'd be... well, back to square one. Click below for further information.

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Hey... we've been BUSY

... and been forced to go underground again as well. We fear we revealed too much in our previous postings, as we started to see the men with sunglasses again, and thus have had to "hit the mattresses." Fortunately, this has a different meaning for us than for Sonny Corleone...