Opinion

 by Brendon J. Wilson

Blah vs. Blah

It’s hard to ignore the plethora of coverage of the run-up to the presidential election, no matter how hard I try. But amidst the coverage of bloggers at the DNC, bloggers at the RNC, Michael Moore being dissed at both events, and the Swift Vet controversy, something is missing from the coverage. What could it be? Hmmm…oh, that’s right – actual examination of the issues!

Here’s something that I’ve noticed: no one seems to have done any serious analysis of either the Democratic platform or the Republican platform. That seems a little weird – or it would, if you hadn’t looked at the contents of either platform and already concluded that to the average person, they’re virtually identical.

A cursory review of the table of contents reveals the common themes (noted in Democrat-speak v. Republican-speak): Defeating Terrorism v. Winning The War on Terror, Strong Healthy Families v. Protecting Our Families, A Strong American Community v. Strengthening Our Communities.

Whoopee! Tell me something I don’t know! Then again, what else would you expect? It’s not like any politician stands up and says, “Hey everybody! I’ve been giving it a lot of thought, and I’ve decided I’m for less funding for education and healthcare!”

And therein lies the problem – everyone’s for everything before the election. Hell, just look at the size of these platforms – forty-one pages for the Democratic platform, and ninety-four pages for the Republican platform. It’s ironic that the Republicans, always pointing fingers at the “ivory tower” Democrats, have to spend twice as many pages on explaining their positions.

Who has the time to read this crap? The Republican paper is flowery, dense, soppy prose that reads like someone caught between a post-near-death-episode rediscovery of God and an overdose on Prozac. And while shorter, the Democratic platform doesn’t seem to be able to get to its point any more directly either. These things should fit into a page of bullet points, or five pages of printed text total – if the average voter can’t read a party’s platform in less than half an hour, then the platform is a failure.

But then, isn’t that the point?

If you could actually consume and ponder the entirety of either party’s stances, you might actually be informed. But voting isn’t about being informed anymore – the issues are complex, and the machinery of government obscure and untrustworthy in the average voter’s eyes. The proceeding devolve to name-calling and muck-raking, reducing the voter’s decision to which candidate is less despicable/or has better hair. In short, it becomes the same variety of popularity contest most people are more likely to associate with high-school elections.

Then again, what do I care? It’s not like I can vote in this country. Nothing to do but sit back, and listen to well-informed strip-club waitresses hold court on the political shenigans at the RNC.

in Opinion / Politics 0 comments
 by Brendon J. Wilson

Olympic-Sized Lunacy

It takes a special class of mental retardation to justify spending millions of dollars on a sporting event that, arguably, could be spent on more important things like, you know, feeding people or something. Leave it to the Olympics to super-size this idiocy to unparalleled paranoid heights.

Taking a page from Fight Club, the IOC decreed the First Rule of the Olympics is: you can’t talk about the Olympics. Yeah, nothing builds up the buzz on the street like a complete dearth of unscripted commentary by the actual people involved in an event. Perhaps the IOC is attempting a subversive attempt to corrupt our youths by having them imagine what’s going on in the minds of athletes during scenes like this?

Moving briskly from that decree to Biblical references, the IOC declared: thou shalt not wear, drink, or think anything not approved by our sponsors. I think I remember this tactic from somewhere, but where? Hmmm….oh, that’s right – that kid who got thrown out of school on “Coke in Education Day” for wearing a Pepsi t-shirt. I mean, what’s next?

Security Guard: “I’m sorry sir, we can’t allow you to enter this event.”
Attendee: “Why? I’ve spent hundreds of dollars on a ticket. I traveled thousands of miles to get here. I’ve already changed into my IOC-sanctioned silver unitard and placed my clothing, camera, phone, outside food, and the part of my brain responsible for forming long-term memories in the incinerator! I even submitted to a urine test, which is bizarre because I’m not even competing! What else could you possibly need from me?”
Security Guard: “Well it says here that you once worked at Niketown, and as you know from the mandatory six-hour orientation session, Reebok is the official shoe of the Olympics…”

Laugh it up – I’m sure Teddy Kennedy never thought he’d end up on a terrorist watch list, but hey, things happen.

In keeping with the belief that deaths must come in threes, the final death came with the censoring of American broadcasts of the games. It started with the censoring of the opening of the games, when some minor percentage of the population was denied the right to see fake plastic penii. And then it continued right on until the networks blocked out the image of a tutu-clad Canuck performing the worst dive entry ever.

Actually, come to think of it, I’m kind of glad they censored that image – nothing’s so harmful to the cachet of being Canadian than some guy in a dress hawking an online gambling web site. Unless he was drunk on Molson Canadian, because then he was just being ironic.

We seem to be trapped in a logic maze constructed by advertising goons, focus groups, and psychopaths working hard towards their Major in Annoyance but slacking on their Minor in Selling Things People They Want. An advertising exec in a room somewhere gets lazy and rather than actually thinking about what a customer cares about, they try to forge artificial relationship by blasting audiences with messages everyone ignores. And then when that fails, they send the Gap Gestapo to hunt you down for wearing a flannel shirt.

Not just any flannel shirt, mind you – last season’s flannel shirt. And they can’t permit that, now can they?

in Opinion 2 comments