Comments or suggestions: Gerard Van der Leun
Who Your Friends Are

Four minutes. If you can't spare the time today, you'll be out of time someday.

This ain't where the road comes to an end
This ain't where the band wagon stops
This is just one of those times when
A lotta folks jump off....

Continued...

Posted by Vanderleun May 25, 2008 8:12 AM | Comments (1)  | QuickLink: Permalink
All Things (Not About Obama) Considered

elder_450a.jpg
Little Annie Fanny mourns, as do we all. Wonderful MADman Will Elder has passed away. We will not see his like again. An Appreciation by Charley Parker @ lines and colors.

Campaign promises from Chuck Norris: If I Am Elected Vice President " It really doesn't matter whose presidential ticket I ride on as vice president because America will be a Chucktatorship when I step into office."

Words to build by: Sippican Cottage: Ten Dreadful Things That Have Become Housing Standards

Brutal Truths- Overheard in Dupont Circle: "Here we have, her brave front temporarily lowered, the typical tragic wail of the childless aging modern urban woman. And her tragedy enabler, the gay boyfriend who will never inject her with the dose of reality she desperately needs."

Kaboom: A Soldier's War Journal: Triple Digits "I speak, of course, of the big ball of orange suck the Tibetan monks and icebergs commonly refer to as the sun."

Greatest dismissive phrase ever: "It is not even wrong." - Wolfgang Pauli

Why did Speed Racer crash and burn? Because its suckage and chaos was mammothsome.

David Warren discovers "just how powerfully the desire to believe in 'little green men' can animate the thinking of minds bereft of sound religion, and/or common sense."

Corporate graffiti. Those really ugly Ikea prints and patterns hidden deep in the stores have been allowed to blight the Monorail in Kobe, Japan.

Tattoo you probably do not want to wear to a strip search:

tattoobomb.jpg

The Showcase Of

BIG Typography

@ Smashing Magazine

which does not include this classic bit of typography:
dvadertoon.jpg

Pelosi's gang winning the race to the bottom: Congress' Approval Rating Ties Lowest in Gallup Records



Posted by Vanderleun May 20, 2008 3:42 AM | Comments (2)  | QuickLink: Permalink
The Perpetual Motion BS Generator: Democrat Propaganda for the 21st Century

Both Democrats and Republicans have long understood one of basic truths about the US: "In America, you never outgrow your need for bullshit." The difference is that the Republicans seem to want to apply that maxim to make profits and get rich, while the Democrats want to use it to obtain power to take away the profits from the rich -and everyone else - through taxes and regulations.

When it comes to making money, the Republicans utilize bullshit brilliantly. Advertising, Marketing, Point-of-Sale, Packaging, Sales Pitches -- all these vast oceans of bullshit are theirs to command and control. Then it all goes to hell.

Strangely, Republicans can't seem to extend their talent for creating, managing, and deploying bullshit into the political realm. For when it comes to making propaganda for the political arena in 2008, the Republicans are running so far behind the Democrats that they are faced with a critical --perhaps lethal -- "Bullshit Gap."

The strategic "Bullshit Gap" in our politics is most obvious when contrasting the small flakes of bullshit drifting down from the John McCain camp these days with the radiant rays of luminous bullshit currently bedazzling millions when projected through the lens of the greatest JFK impersonator since Vaughn Meader, Barack H. Obama. But the bullshit gap is even visible in the small towns of America, those areas bypassed by the large mercantile bullshit generators of our culture and hence starved for fresh bullshit of any kind.

Case in point:

Continued...

Posted by Vanderleun May 14, 2008 6:51 PM | Comments (23)  | QuickLink: Permalink
The White Chick, the Cool Clique, and the Black Dude

1970srs.jpg

Kids can be so cruel. Especially those kids in the cool kids' clique. Once they decide that somebody who was cool once is cool no more, there's no limit to what they'll do to get that person out of the clique. They'll shun her, they'll rank on her, they'll make fun of her pants suits, they'll even call her the baddest bad name they can think of -- "Racist."

Hillary was a cool kid once, but now she's cool no more. What made her cool -- "She's a chick running for class President! How cool is that?!" -- has been trumped by the coolest Democrat cool of all -- "He's a black guy running for class President! Dude!" You can't get cooler than that. There is no American cool cooler than black cool, especially if it shows up in sharp suits and talks smooth with only a soupcon of ghetto speak.

Obama is now the coolest kid in the Democrat clique. The clique, as cliques will, wants Hillary to butt out and just let him be Class President. They want her out before Democrat High gets together in the Denver gym to nominate their President.

After all, when everybody who's currently playing at Democrat politics was playing at high school politics popularity was always trumping real elections, real nominations. Why actually finish the race? It will only, so the polls say, underscore the real popularity and base that Hillary's won. It will only point up the deepening flaws in the Obama run. How uncool is that?

So Hillary should just realize she's now uncool and, well, "Just fuck off girlfriend!" She needs to get out before the cool kids have to do the really bad thing -- slap her with the Racist paddle, cover her with tar and feathers and ride her out of town on a rail. They're warming up the tar. It's at the melting point now. You can see the Racism paddle being dipped in the pot. Here comes the big smear. It's gonna leave a mark.

Continued...

Posted by Vanderleun May 12, 2008 6:27 AM | Comments (22)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Jackets? We don't have to give you no steenkin' jackets!

nakedhallowell2.jpg
It does basically make you look fat and naked, but you see all this stuff." - Susan Hallowell (above), Director of TSA's Security Laboratory.

Proof that there is no airline service so cheap and shoddy that some bean-counter can't make it worse:
The woman checking me in informed me that Delta discontinued the use of the ticket jackets as of Monday in order to help cut costs!
Food goes, blankets go, seats get jammed in, pillows vanish, oxygen is reduced, peanuts change into tasteless "freeze-baked crunchy things with salt" which come two to a pack and you only get one. Don't even get me started on Homeland Security which is just biding its time until you will be required to fly naked after an anal probe by uniformed dwarf.

I know I am far from alone when I say that after years of flying many times a year, often on a whim, I am now at the point where only the most powerful forces in life -- love and death -- can get me on a plane.

Continued...

Posted by Vanderleun May 7, 2008 8:41 AM | Comments (35)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Party in the House of Pain: Tout le Seattle Will Be There Sans Moi Bien Sur

MasqueOfTheRedDeath%281964film%29.jpg

Having seen it all, I don't wanna see no more. I spent decades in the Palace of Kink and don't need to do any more hard time. Suffice it to say, with the poet, "sex without love wears gay deceivers." No matter, the grey sponge helmet of Seattle's unceasing reign of rain drives its inmates to greater and greater heights of insanity and "celebration." And there is no refuge since the clinically insane are so compelled to "share."

Tonight's chapter of Seattle's Psychopathia Sexualis is the Forbidden Fashion Show. Here is how the producer is describing the event:

The amazing opening of the show will feature the talented dancers of DassDance,. The extravagant display will be a fusion of contemporary dance and northern Venezuelan drums (tambores), as the dancers cavort and whirl, donning colorful authentic Venezuelan masks.
What breathless excitement will waft over the audience! One can only imagine the tingles and the thrills as the "drums (tambores)" kick in, and the crisp snap of poppers is heard throughout the room. Then the "colorful masks" will be deployed.

But wait, that's not all.

We have not yet heard from that driving spike of the way-new economy, "The Boutiques:"

As the introductory performance wanes, the models will make their entrance, framed by the antics of the dancers. The models will parade a modern, hip blend of style and everyday fashion from *Retail Therapy, the first of our line of local designers and boutiques.

The mystical, musical strains of the Eastern world, invoking images of silk scarves and belly dancing beauties will be a prelude to our next boutique, *HAREM combining culture with sensuality comparable to the grand Egyptian Empire of old, featuring hats, handbags, veils, and mens robes, culminating in a dreamscape of imagination.

"Culminating in a dreamscape of imagination." One would say, "You can't make this shit up," except that some demented mind has indeed made it up. Ah well, second-rate cities demand second-rate copy.

But wait, that's not all!

You might think you've had enough of some twitching twinks in Venezuelan masks, but they are rented by the evening so you might as well haul them back out.

Return of DassDance: Here the dancers explode in a frenzy of grunge and intense, gyrating rock and roll, evoking the darker side of the audience, and assisting them in delving into the dominatrix inside of us all, as we introduce the next local boutique.

Well, given the amount of drugs and booze DassDance has probably consumed at this point, why wouldn't they jump back out to "explode in a frenzy of grunge?"

After all, the last dubious thing that Seattle contributed to the culture was, ahem, "Grunge." This blight on the nation was born in.... wait for it.... 1981! That's it. One idea every 25 years. Seattle's desperate rock scene has been dining out on it for decades, with no signs of dumping it back in the dented dumpster of rock history from which it was exhumed. Instead, grunge survives in this city because it satisfies the three prime requirements of rock-culture crapola: it is easy and cheap and requires no talent at all. In these elements, grunge might be seen as the harbinger of rap, but I'm sure the brothers would not agree.

In all the "frenzy of grunge" is a perfect prelude to the audience's diving into "the dominatrix inside us all." Whether or not it will be necessary to surface and shower down after such a profound dirt dive is left unsaid. After all, there is some grime ground so deep that not even a scrub-down with a steel bristle brush can get it out. (Not that some in the audience wouldn't crave to try it.) But it does little good to put down dirt. Much better to "celebrate it!"

One of the local names for Seattle is "Emerald City," but scenes like this one remind you that large neighborhoods resemble the prison of "Oz" on HBO, much more than the fabled city of Dorothy and her pals.

But wait, that's not all

Just when you thought it was safe to have safe sex, it's time for "The Crypt:"

The Crypt has long been a place where leather and chains rule, where you give in to your inner fire This is embodied by the clothes exhibited here, as black is prevalent, and flaming passion is a likely result from these sexy accessories. Women will be dressed dominatrix-style in corsets and boustiers, while the men will be sporting spikes, kilts and boxer briefs.
In a way, the good thing about being an atheist in Seattle in America in 2008 is that there is no waiting for Hell. Every single Saturday there's a fresh one tailor-made for you. Full of fun, fashion, frivolity, and all your friends. Just show up and there you are, all decked out in STDs in pretty colors and bright red Venezuelan masks.

Edgar Allen Poe couldn't have planned it better.

And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all. Edgar Allan Poe: The Masque of the Red Death
Party on, Dudes! I'd go, but frankly I don't have a thing to wear.



Posted by Vanderleun May 3, 2008 3:05 PM | Comments (4)  | QuickLink: Permalink
What The Essayists Are Saying Round 4

batheader.jpg

Continued...

Posted by Vanderleun May 2, 2008 10:22 AM | QuickLink: Permalink
G2E Media GmbH

MONTHLY ARCHIVES


SIDELINES

FIND


BACKMATTER

RECENT ITEMS