Thought Roulette

>> During the great health care debacle, I wanted to make a point about how much it would cost certain Senators to buy their health insurance on the open market. The only thing was, many many Senators qualify for Medicare, which meant 1) I couldn't say, "See, your health insurance would cost $1500 a month and wouldn't cover your wife's stays at the Betty Ford Clinic" and 2) our Senate is clearly populated by the olds. Today, Alex Pareene (formerly of Gawker, now apparently of Salon) noted that this Congress is officially the oldest Congress ever. Apparently, being senile does not disqualify anyone from voting on minor little things like wars and whatnot. I grant that it's hard to differentiate between senility and batshit insanity, but still...Call me cynical (if you haven't already) but somehow I doubt that these guys are making decisions with the seventh generation in mind. ("Global warming? How soon will Manhattan be under water? 2030? Fuck it, I'm not going to be around for that.") Fun fact: Senator Robert Byrd was born the year the United States declared war on Germany the first time.

>> Sarah Palin is publishing a book. It is entitled--and I am not making this up--"America By Heart: Reflections on Family, Faith and Flag." Now while I can see someone, perhaps not Sarah Palin, but someone, having reflections on family, and it is possible to have reflections on faith, I am baffled as to how exactly one reflects on flag. Not the flag, not a flag...but just flag. Do articles of faith prohibit the use of articles in text?

>> Apparently, the Tea Baggers in Maine have managed to replace the Republican party platform with their own platform, which is a very special blend of crazy. Among other things, while going all out for "the rights of the unborn" (in passing, "the unborn" is an oddly creepy phrase) they also want to reject the U.N. Treaty on the Rights of the Child. Interesting. If only those children could un-born themselves, they could have some rights back. In the meantime, we will stand proudly with Somalia as the only nation that has not ratified this treaty. They would also like to "discard political correctness" and "Investigate collusion between government and industry in the global warming myth"and something about "Return to the principles of Austrian economics" which, um, irony alert?

One thing that I find very strange about these folk is their propensity for taking an outraged stand against things that no one is actually proposing (for example, a one world government or currency; or for that matter, is political correctness really so oppressive? When you want to call a woman--say, Hillary Rodham Clinton--a bitch, do people materialize out of nowhere and staple your tongue? Isn't this whole anti-political-correctness thing really a little temper tantrum because you can't call the other kids names anymore?)

As for the "collusion between government and industry" in perpetuating the "global warming myth" this is just so retarded I can't even get into it, especially because Sarah Palin just showed up to staple my tongue for using the word "retarded." It's okay, though, it's not "political correctness" if it's for Jesus.