First, qualifications of a campaign manager:

1)Military experience preferred (not so much as to overtake it though).

2)Must show an ability to intimidate.

3)Must not be afraid to destroy dissidents.

Strategies involved:

1)Must arm supporters (this is usually easier for the incumbent dictator, particular if he also heads the military). If the dictator in power does not control the military however, the general who does makes for a great opposition candidate.

2)The areas with the largest concentration of opponents must have the greatest obstacles to vote. Opponents should be willing to dodge machine gun fire.

3)Feeding supporters. People need to eat and if you feed them right before they hit the ballot box, this will be taken into heavy consideration.

4)How many dead people can vote without the UN noticing? Of course, this doesn’t really matter anyways as the UN can only voice their displeasure, without taking significant action.

I’m not sure I have what it takes for this position but I’m willing to discuss any offers. If you are a dictator in power or a general seeking power and are interested in my services, please email me.

photo credit: flickr

Post from: Sirened

McClellan’s book “What Happened” is a wonderful tale about what happened, without really telling what happened. Despite the fact that McClellan left his Press Secretary duties some two years ago, the man literally lives and breathes the spin.

McClellan has no clue whether any additional White House officials broke the law in the leaking of CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity. He does know that the Bush administration could have been more honest about things, but they didn’t necessarily lie and he himself, of course, did not lie.

This did not stop Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Michigan) from boldly stating “It seems clear that Mr. Libby, Mr. Card, the president and the vice president were all involved in directing Mr. McClellan to falsely vouch for Mr. Libby, despite Mr. McClellan’s earlier reservations.”

Whatever, I figured this little charade was a good excuse to show my jackass picture with the female James Bond once again. To read my take on seeing and meeting the very classy Valerie Plame, go here.

photo credit: personal collection

Post from: Sirened

In 2007, there were 168,900 deaths in Florida. 2,328 of these deaths were caused by pain killers (Vicodine, Oxycontin, etc.), 743 deaths were due to benzodiazepines (Xanax, Valium, etc.) and alcohol was judged to have been the killer 466 times (it was in the bodies of 4,179 people that died).

The deaths from all illegal drugs (cocaine, heroine, ecstasy, etc.) came in at 989. The real kicker here, numbers of deaths from marijuana: 0. Yup, none, not a single person in the state of Florida died from the use of marijuana in 2007.

And yet marijuana is not only illegal in the United States, but people get arrested and get caught up in the system over a joint. I’m not saying that the USA should legalize marijuana, but at least decriminalize it, this was a big issue for former Senator Mike Gravel who was thrown out of the democratic presidential debates. And of course the rest of the democrats completely ignored the serious issue of a rising prison population due to bullshit.

In the Netherlands, soft drug use is viewed as a health issue, not a criminal issue. Nobody gets arrested for smoking a joint. If a police officer sees someone smoking a joint in a public place where they obviously should not be smoking (ie. not a designated coffee shop or desolate area in the park), that person will get chewed out and told to put it out, they will not go to jail over crap.

Of course, decriminalizing marijuana would eat into the profits of drugs companies, whose drugs kill more people than all street drugs combined.

photo credit: personal collection

Post from: Sirened

The Pentagon fed us propaganda after we invaded Iraq…You don’t say!

A list of 5 Ways that Hillary Clinton can still win the democratic nomination…Spoiler alert: 1 of them involves changing the minimum voting age to 60.

John McCain opposes US troops getting too educated.

Medical marijuana just celebrated its 30th birthday in the USA! Congratulations marijuana!

John McCain on Bush economy: 4 more years!

Hillary’s “base” includes West Virginia voters who believe that Barack Obama is Muslim.

Ron Paul revolution planning to topple Republican national convention?

World starting to run low on fish??

Karl Rove refuses to testify under oath because he is ‘The Highlander.’

photo credit: personal collection

Post from: Sirened

Congressional democrats will fund the Iraq war so they can end it. It’s that Catch-22 logic.
NY Times readership is down, NBC’s Brian Williams mocks them on his blog.

Eliot Spitzer prostitute Ashley Dupre suing Girls Gone Wild founder Joe Francis for being a douche bag. But hey, who isn’t?

Last year 7% of Americans got married so they could get health insurance. Wow, so Mitt Romney’s secret health plan is working!

Those pesky Tibetan monks are trying to insight some riots again. This time pissing off Chinese students at USC.

Creepy story about a Dad who gets his 18 year old daughter involved in legalized Nevada prostitution, even giving her bikini waxes.

Bill O’Reilly weighs in on Miley Cyrus. Why the hell not?

OPEC representative warns that oil may hit $200 a barrel!

Supreme Court rules that it is not unconstitutional for states to require a photo ID to vote.

44 US deaths so far makes April the deadliest month in Iraq since September.

Post from: Sirened

Last night was the final White House Correspondents’ Dinner for George W. Bush and it sure is nice that lots of “final” things keep occurring for him as president. It’s still a ways until the best final thing, his final day as president, but for the moment I’ll take this one.

President Bush was in fine form last night, poking fun at Dick Cheney and himself for fucking up the world. Being the last correspondents’ dinner, this was a reflective one, highlighting previous dinners dating back to 2001 and reminding us what a long ass time he’s been in power.

But his speech was funny and he does a good enough job at delivering what the speech writing people’s wrote for him. He talks about how diverse the crowd is, with people from Mitt Romney to Pamela Anderson, saying that isn’t those two in the same room a sign of the apocalypse? And with the word apocalypse, there was no better person to transition to than Darth Cheney. He’s the real evil mastermind! Haha!

Ah, it’s so funny, too bad we have to go back to reality now and deal with a war in Iraq, fuel crisis, food crisis, health crisis, environmental crisis, recession, massive budget deficit, (some crisis that slips me) and the next president having to somehow clean up this mess with the help of a Pinocchio Congress that’s run by lobbyists.

Post from: Sirened

Yet another scam…People claiming to be the IRS, asking for your information so you can get your “tax refund.”

Why the health care debate might be a steamy load of crap.

What’s this about a congressman claiming a $300 campaign tab for “lodging” at a bar with no lodging?

From John McCain’s fake blog: Taking economic advice from his even more senile mother.

Jenna Bush is confused and may accidentally vote democrat. My marker slipped…Doh!

Hillary Clinton will be ready on Day 1…to nuke Iran.

Florida thinking to bring Jesus to license plates.

Is Clinton’s Pennsylvania win the closest she gets to Obama?

China and Dr. Evil suing CNN…for 1 billion dollars!

Is it time to give up on looking for a cure for Aids?

Lame duck and bored President Bush appears on dumbass Deal or No Deal, automatically sinks ratings by 27%.

Post from: Sirened

These days though, Craig’s List has become as well known for its scams as it is for legitimate content. Luckily many of the scams are pretty obvious, like anything that involves the country of Nigeria. It’s amazing how unoriginal many of the scam artists are, so many involved in apartment rentals are “Nigerian ministers” with poor English grammar who want you to take good care of their property, blah blah, send them the money and they’ll send you the keys. Type in just about any city in the world on Craig’s List and you’ll find these “ministers.”

When my wife and I recently relocated from Tampa, FL to Amsterdam, Netherlands we were extremely frustrated at the difficulty in finding legitimate apartment listings for Amsterdam on Craig’s List. But part of me kept thinking, why are they all in Nigeria? Aren’t there people in say Burma or Somalia that want some of this action? There’s plenty of dirt poor countries out there, why is it always Nigeria? And if I went to Nigeria, how easy would it be to actually meet some of these “ministers?” (By the way, if I do this trip I’ll be sure to let you guys know!)

The founder of Craig’s List, Craig Newmark, prides himself and his tiny staff for offering a great service at little to no cost and for not having sold the site for a few billion dollars. Craig and company argue that because of the large amount of transactions and anonymity they have no idea how much money, items and sexual favors pass through the site each day. Craig’s List does have a flagging system for scams but many believe this isn’t enough. Some feel that people should be able to leave direct comments on a post they know is a scam. Others believe there should at least be a $1 fee to post something in order to reduce scams.

Personally, I think that a spam bot should remove any post that includes “Nigeria” and “minister” in it. At the very least this would allow the people of Cameroon to take advantage of the highly lucrative Craig’s List scam business.

Post from: Sirened

Anyways, if you hate Michael Vick but have a sadistic sense of humor, or love him (and if you’re a fan of pit bull fighting why wouldn’t you?) pick up this t-shirt from A Drunk Buffalo T-Shirt Company. It really is damn wrong but I think it’s hilarious-yeah I’m an asshole. But if you purchase one of these t-shirts $1 goes to a pit bull rescue charity and the other good cause here is my cousin Jeff’s wallet.

So pick up one today, I owe my cousin for free t-shirts, beer and a place to crash last time I was in Buffalo. Dude, does this shameless plug make us even?

Post from: Sirened

Mississippi Senator Trent Lott has had enough of becoming as irrelevant as the US Constitution itself. The former senate majority leader even had a difficult time collecting on his claim with State Farm after Hurricane Katrina.

Trent Lott stepped down as senate majority leader in 2002 after he was criticized for saying “When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over the years, either.” The comment was viewed as one that supported segregated water fountains but Lott said he was just trying to make an old man feel good on his birthday.

Lott was re-elected to the Senate in 2006 but decided to step down now because he likes to get things done and said there’s still “time left to do something else.” Yes, and he will be able to become a lobbyist much quicker now since a new law will take effect December 31st that doubles the amount of time required for senators to wait until they can officially bribe their former colleagues.

Good ole’ days image from this place.

Post from: Sirened