So randomly browsing the internet today, I found the following web comic.  It paints a favorite childrens Christmas in a new and satanic light.
 

 
Seriously though.  This is like super creepy.  There is no way that I will ever be able to listen to that song again without picturing this comic again.  Evil Satan Frosty Snowman from HELL BE GONE!!!    

A perfect storm has been created by a series of earthly events recently which have exposed a few of the true evils underlying amongst America’s cultural undercurrents; guilt, elitism and racism.

We’re a sick, pathetic society at times. Fueled by mis-reporting and underreporting by a lame media that stretches from the USA Today far past Fox News, our culture has ignored the suffering of its fellow citizens while playing right into the narrative of America being a guilty nation and bending over backwards to send money to a wasted piece of God’s earth which has no chance of thriving anytime in our lifetime.

Chances are you have little idea what I’m talking about. That’s equally as pathetic. No doubt you are aware that Haiti suffered what we’re told we must believe is a “horrible, awful, catastrophic” earthquake a few months ago, bringing an already “delicate” country on shaky foundations crumbling back down to third world status. Oh, the humanity. God knows that you couldn’t escape the massive media coverage of the Haiti earthquake for days, nay weeks, afterwards.

Chances are equally as likely that you are unaware of the suffering of American citizens at the hands of mother nature as well; at the time of this writing the death toll in Tennessee as a result of massive flooding has reached 19 people; not just people but American citizens (unlike, say…Haitians!); and the death toll from the entire area (Kentucky and Mississippi are affected as well) is over 30 Americans and the damage to one of America’s most historic and beautiful places in monstrous. Landmarks and destination resorts will remain closed until Christmas and the price tag of the devastation will eclipse $1 billion, with many of the victims not being covered on their insurance policies against flooding (as is true of the overwhelming majority of Americans).

Yet while telethons were hurriedly rushed onto the international airwaves to beg for money to help the people in Haiti while thousands of journalists broadcast live from Port Au Prince daily, seemingly no one is doing anything to report, pay attention to, or bring light to Tennessee. Anderson Cooper, of CNN, traveled to Nashville last week, days after the flooding, to finally report on the suffering, but only after country music singer Kenny Chesney made a live video phone call to Cooper’s show demanding to know where the media was. While better late than never may be an age-old expression, it is not a credible way to run a news organization.

So why the disconnect? Why is Tennessee ignored while Haiti and New Orleans are fawned over? Because Tennessee is nothing but a bunch of white, racist, uneducated, redneck, gun-toting, bible-thumping hicks that drive pickups and burn crosses. New Orleans, meanwhile, is filled with poor, desperate, African Americans and immigrants who are just trying to get ahead in life but who have never been given a fair chance and are held down by racist, bigoted policies supported by white, racist, uneducated, redneck, gun-toting, bible-thumping hicks. Haiti, meanwhile, is the most beautiful island on earth, yet America has ignored its glorious neighbor to the south and allowed it to waste away aimlessly and recklessly, rather than supporting and lifting up the island of dark skinned people that are good, honest, hard working folks who just want to get ahead in life and should be given the chance by America since we have so much and they have so little. (Note: you are supposed to ignore the $5 billion sent to Haiti in financial aid by America in the decade preceding the earthquake. Please do not allow facts to get in the way of your hypocritical elitist racism).

I have traveled to Tennessee half a dozen times in my life. I have never been to New Orleans or Haiti and plan on never going based solely on the human sludge that has been paraded before us in both places ad nauseum; wretched, vile human beings with their hands out blaming the government while expecting that same government to save them from their miserable, self created rotten existence. The people of Haiti and New Orleans are the exact same people; lazy dirt bags unwilling to take advantage of the endless array of opportunity before them and first in line to blame everyone else for their lot in life and feel entitled to a solution being handed to them.

Tennessee folks, meanwhile, say things like “thank you,” and “sir” or “ma’am.” They shake your hand firmly while looking you in the eye, politely and respectfully disagree with you when there’s dissention and expect nothing from you in return other than kindness and earned respect. Whether they love Jesus or their pick-up trucks they go about their business, most of them barely getting by, but doing it on their own with a sense of pride unknown and unmatched in most parts of America. They neither ask for, nor in most cases, accept hand-outs, demanding to earn everything they achieve. Like so many people in what elitist snobs like to call “flyover country,” they are the salt of the Earth and the heart of the nation and we do everything we can to ignore them, demean them, marginalize them and mock them.

When an oil spill headed towards the shores of New Orleans creating an ecological disaster for business and birds, President Obama couldn’t get on TV fast enough to pledge his support and promise to fly to the area and view the devastation.

When a flood wiped out honest, hard working people’s homes and killed dozens of Americans in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Mississippi, the President quietly declared the area the disaster, and made no speeches and brought no attention to the plight of the suffering. Seagulls matter, southerners don’t.

New Orleans is home to jazz and some of the greatest blues singers known to mankind; it’s the birthplace of one of America’s greatest musical institutions and a place that has not only welcomed but elevated countless African American entertainers.

Tennessee is home to Nashville and that twangy, woman-hating, dog loving country music that is the blight of America’s entertainment industry and an embarrassment to the nation as a whole; a musical genre that can count on one hand how many black folk have ever been welcomed to the alleged art and an area as a whole that reveres the Klan more than diversity. That’s how elites see it. It’s no contest; New Orleans and Haiti suffers because of America, Tennessee suffers because it deserves to.

Prior to its earthquake, Haiti was a wasteland of corruption, poverty and despair and a symbolic message to the world of wasted potential. Think of what Haiti could be if its people worked for it and demanded it; an island destination in one of the most beautiful, atmospherically perfect places on earth; yet they piss it away generation after generation. After the earthquake, it’s the exact same, just with more rubble. Big loss.

Prior to the floods, Tennessee was a destination and a thriving, beautiful state with everything from the most visited National Park in America (the Smoky Mountains), to the Grand Ole Opry, to some of the most amazing waterfalls on the planet. After the floods, Tennessee, unlike Haiti and New Orleans, will rebuild itself. They will proudly work harder than anyone else in America to get back, on their own, what they rightfully have earned and built. And somehow, no doubt, they will be mocked for it. We will find a way as a nation to ridicule the hard working achievers who rise and rest each day with pride, while we will simultaneously revere those who desperately suck every last ounce of charity and hard work out of the rest of us.

Give your money to Haiti; I’m sure the despicable despot who runs the country will enjoy using it to smoke a Cuban cigar in his castle. My money is going to Tennessee because they’ve earned it.

Good Morning Everyone! 
 
Now as you all proabably don't know, the Elder Scrolls series is one of my top five favorite video game series of all time.  The other day, I was going through my X-Box game shelf (I have a shelf for each of the current gen consoles) and I realized that my copy of Oblivion was missing.  Frantic I started tearing through my room looking for it.  The game was nowhere to be found.  It wasn't in any drawers, or under the bed, or in the closet.  With my room a mess, I decided to sit down and try to remember what happened to the disk.  After pondering it for a few minutes, I remembered what happened.  I dropped the original disk.  It was messy.  Unreadable disk errors abound after that mishap.  So I decided that I was going to go and buy the game anew next time I was at an electronics/game store. 
 
Well, yesterday was the day.  I went to Best Buy to get my mom's Mother's Day gift (she has been dying to get that damn Wii Fit Plus on the family Wii.  It will never touch my Wii), so I went to go pick that up.  Once I picked up the game, I decided just to check the 360 area and see if they had Oblivion in stock.  They did.  One last copy.  It was like a sign from the Gods.  I grabbed the game without hesitation and happily payed the full $29.99 for it.   
 
I didn't pop the game in my console at all last night because I knew that hours upon hours would just vanish as I started playing the game, so I resorted to playing Super Street fighter IV until it was time for sleep.  This morning is a different story entirely.  Oblivion is running once again in my 360 and its glorious.  I have not made it very far on a new character (a Khajit Agent who has only just made it out of the sewers and massacred a small camp of bandits without being seen with my trusty bow), but I have a feeling that very very soon, I will truly be an unstoppable force from the shadows.  I am currently in the Imperial City offloading my goods so that I can pillage some nearby dungeons and caves without fear of having to leave anything behind.  
 
Needless to say, I friggen LOVE this game.  Hopefully some of you other folks on the site love the game as much as I do. 
 
-Cheers

A headline in the Los Angeles Times last week said “Studio chief urges theater operators to trade in popcorn for peaches.” The banner on AOL’s homepage was more direct and bold as it said “Say goodbye to popcorn at the movies.” (I cant link the actual page that says that because it was on AOL's rotating banner page) Both stories and hundreds others like it across the nation were referring to a new push to motivate movie theaters in America to sell healthy snacks.

The only problem? The headlines were completely false and misleading.

The headlines not only imply, but staunchly proclaim an end to movie theater popcorn. AOL literally says “Say goodbye to popcorn…” with a sub-headline that read “if one man gets his way.” There’s no need to read anything into a headline like that; obviously some nut wants to force movie theaters to stop selling highly caloric food and instead sell only healthy options.

This surprised me though, because we had talked about the story on the air and I had made the clear distinction that this new movement was not about banning junk food, but rather it was about adding healthy alternatives. It was, so to speak, yet another social experiment (which, as a side note, I should point out, will fail miserably…the behavior police are constantly amazed that most Americans want to make choices of their own free will that are bad them…but I digress).

So I did what most people never take the time to do anymore; I actually read the story. Lo and behold, it took me less than 60 seconds to find the actual quote from Michael Lynton, head of Sony Pictures, who is leading the healthy-food-at-theaters charge:

“Adding healthier options to your existing menu is the right thing to do for our industry, for audiences and for our country”

Adding? What the hell? Adding?

That seems incredibly reasonable to me…all this guy is endorsing is more choice; if it fails to garner business, no doubt the theaters will discontinue the operation…if it works, then consumers will be happier and theaters will improve their bottom line.

But wait…where is the juicy part about Mr. Lynton wanting to ban popcorn as the headlines clearly said was the case?

It doesn’t exist…he never said or implied such a thing.

Yet, in a nation that takes no time to research anything and stupidly believes anything it sees, hears or reads, millions of Americans immediately started walking around spouting off the un-truth that “they’re going to ban movie popcorn!”

Ignorance is never an excuse; if you think it is, try telling a cop that you “didn’t know what the speed limit was,” and see how far that gets you. No doubt the media is culpable on all sides of the political spectrum, but they’re not evil. The media is irresponsible but not malicious. As a right-of-center guy, after years of watching Fox News gleefully proclaim themselves “fair and balanced” I have realized the truth of all media; they’re not biased, they’re human. Worse, they’re American.

When writers at Fox are formulating a story about gun control, they view the story through their own personal prism that says the right to own a gun is guaranteed to all Americans and is un-arguable. When writers at MSNBC craft the exact same story they view it through the prism that says reasonable gun control is a way to save lives without restricting anyone’s right to own a gun. Both viewpoints are arguable to be sure, but to the writers and reporters, the only perception that is truthful is their own. So in the end, the exact same story receives totally different headlines and presentations:

FOX: New restrictions on gun ownership proposed
MSNBC: Safety advocates hail new proposal

In the case of the movie theater popcorn headline, it is one of the following:

#1: Laziness on the part of the headline writers who were unwilling to read as far into the story as I was to actually get the truth of the story

#2: Injection of personal opinion; either to say this is where we are headed, or this is where we want to be headed: no more popcorn at theaters

#3: Good business; the headline writers know that dirt and juice sell. Choice is not juicy, banning something is, so they write a headline that is totally false to get their readers’ blood boiling.

I’m betting it’s #3

People that argue that the media has a responsibility to objectively report the news are simply dishonest and lazy. The only person responsible for your knowledge is you. Just because we live in a nation that regurgitates rumors and headlines as fact doesn’t make it an acceptable practice. Following the majority off of a cliff still leaves you dead…and in this case, ignorant as well.

There are certain comments, statements and opinions so stunningly ignorant and/or far from the truth that they take my breath away. Recently, I read such a column, distributed worldwide, published by a prominent British newspaper, and heralded across the world as “enlightening,” when in fact the truth is that the opinion piece is utterly false, baseless and in total contravention to both facts and the intent of America’s founding. 

To summarize the article in a few words, the gist is this; a man who kills an abortion doctor should be forbidden, outside of a courtroom, from explaining why he did it. 
(Actual Article)

The columnist argues that allowing a murderer to use our right to free speech in America as a tool to propagandize what she correctly refers to as the man’s terrorist activity is “not what free speech was meant for.”  

A person could not be more wrong than she. This is precisely what the first amendment was, and is, for and fear mongering ideologues like this columnist should be ostracized by the entire nation for her elitism and total lack of knowledge of our nation and its very founding principles. 

Sadly, her position is neither surprising nor rare. More than a decade ago we reached critical mass when it came to dissenting opinion and the mantra has remained in place; you have the right to speak your mind unless I disagree with you, then you do not. Freedom never tasted so restrictive. 

Hiding behind asinine proclamations that bear no actual weight or truth (but sound so good when they are repeated over and over again) such as “it’s for the greater good,” or “it’s to protect society,” this columnist makes the claim that because this murdering scumbag is so insane and disgusting to have killed an abortion doctor he should not be given a platform to propagate his beliefs and position. Her argument suggests that by doing so, we legitimize him and people like him and perhaps even recruit a few followers to mimic his behavior, or at the very least, justify it. Nothing is as offensive as the on-going campaign against the American people; insisting that they are too stupid to formulate their own opinions and when they do, we will only support them if they agree with the ruling intellectual class. 

Allow me to demonstrate the opinion writer’s belief system: 

1. A psychopath who kills an abortion doctor and justifies it is “allowed” to speak under the guise of free speech and justifies his behavior in the name of “saving the lives of yet to be born children.”

2. The American public hears that and agrees with it, nodding their heads in unison while they clean their rifles.

3. Abortion doctors are murdered en masse. 

There is no denying that this is what she is afraid of; if it’s not then why is she so upset? If the converse were true in her mind, that the overwhelming majority of us will acknowledge that this guy is a nut who belongs in prison or dead, then why would she be concerned at all? 

Quick side note and hypocrisy test; I doubt that this columnist would be so offended at a member of the Earth Liberation Front, an actual terrorist organization according to the United States Government, defending its’ actions of burning down million dollar homes and SUV’s on car lots in the name of “saving the planet?” If she would be, then at least she’s not a hypocrite. 

Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming and the answer to why this writer and those like her is at all concerned about a man justifying his killing of an abortion doctor: two reasons; for starters, she believes that the overwhelming majority of us are too stupid to make our own decisions and secondly, she doesn’t care about dissent; even if it’s a small minority of people this woman, like most elitists, demands that everyone agrees with her, behaves the way she does and arrives at the same conclusions she does and she will not rest until it is so; if she must muzzle people to arrive there, so be it. 

Which brings us back to the fallacy of her premise; allowing people like this clown who killed an abortion doctor to speak is exactly what free speech is for and precisely why America remains the shining star of the world. Not only are we not afraid of the words of tyrants, despots, maniacs and zealots, we seek them out; we crave them; we desire their thoughts so that we can be better prepared to destroy them. This is the very essence of the motivation behind free speech; the ability of a small, sometime pitifully so, group of people to speak their mind, their motivations, their theory and their tactics so that we can either choose to join up with them, or garner valuable knowledge to defeat them. 

The founding of this nation, in the late 1700’s began as a pitifully small group of “extremists” who had the audacity to speak out against and directly to power. It was through their words, and quite frankly for a decade, their words alone, that everyone ranging from Alexander Hamilton to Patrick Henry to George Washington to James Madison and Benjamin Franklin continued making compelling argument after compelling argument why American colonists should demand their independence from King George; this, at a time when Americans under British rule enjoyed the second best quality of life on Earth, behind only those citizens of Great Britain itself.

Imagine the reaction to such words and claims at the time. In America in 1775, life was basically as good as it could seemingly get. People generally had access to what, at the time, was good food, clean living and solid medical attention. Yet along came these few dozen clowns who had the hubris to demand not that they and their fellow colonists could do it better, but that they should be given the freedom to fail on their own, rather than be ruled by a king who provided everything for them; in fact he supplied too much, they argued. 

After years of making a case solely on the merits of independence, all reports and writings of the time indicate that no more than one third of their fellow American colonists supported their cause. Throughout the revolutionary war, Washington and his army were continuously confronted with fellow Americans who refused to help their march towards independence.  

Stories such as these are the literal reason that the very first amendment to the United States constitution guarantees citizens the right to say anything they want; the right to free speech. The founders knew that the single most important way to protect a citizenry was to demand that it always had a voice and an outlet to bring down power. 

So…did I just compare a murderer to Thomas Jefferson? Hardly. 

This is the misunderstood beauty of what makes America the greatest societal experiment ever created. The lone patriot who is proven by history to be 100% correct is guaranteed the exact same access and right to free speech as the lone gunman whose value system is so warped that he wallows in delusion every waking moment. That is the essence of free speech and the essence of America; a nation in which two people, who literally despise one another will fight alongside one another so that tomorrow, they will both have the freedom to say aloud why the other is still wrong.    

Our nosy, know-better-than-you society is continuing to creep into the daily lives of Americans. Thirty years ago, the joke was that we would all have cameras in our homes so that we could be monitored by local, state and federal officials; today the joke is, “what comes after the cameras?” 

Call it what you will; Nanny-state, behavior control, do-gooderism, projection, transference, whatever. The idea that people can’t mind their own business is nothing new on this planet. The idea that people insist that you think the way they do and behave the way they do is also nothing new. 

However, in the last half century we as a people have allowed the greatest level of behavior and thought control creep into our lives, all in the name of doing what’s right for “the greater good.” Whether it’s to protect people from things that have almost no likelihood of happening, or it’s designed to save people from “unhealthy”, though legal, choices, or whether it’s to decrease the burden on the public healthcare system, restriction after law after tax after condemnation after elimination has been imposed on and endless array of totally legal activities:

In every single example above, there is an intrusion upon the lives, privacy and individuality of Americans, all in the name of defending or protecting the “common and/or greater good.” It is stifling, sickening and oppressive and it has been part of a systematic movement to remove our uniqueness and create a culture of sameness, equality, fairness and the like. It is the culmination of a variety of groups unwittingly coming together to ultimately control you. The people behind these movements range from grieving parents who now define their own self worth as attempting to protect others from the pain they felt, to outright elitists who simply believe that you are too stupid to make decisions for yourself. In the middle are people who define freedom as allowing you to make choices as long you think the way they do. Along the way, there are emotional do-gooders who demand that they be judged on intentions, not results. Mix in a few blatant Marxists and Nazis and you’ve got a full recipe for the nation’s current epidemic of Nanny-ism. 

As was argued centuries ago, the problem with allowing people to infringe on your personal freedoms, choices and behaviors once is that there’s no end to it. Once you open the door and set the precedent, there is no stopping every form of behavior control available to every nosy, self righteous group and elitist on Earth. Once you allow people to say that totally legal activities should be regulated, limited or controlled under the guise of “protecting people,” there is no end to what that argument will be used against. Eventually, it and they will attack, limit, restrict and ban something that you love and it will be totally your fault for allowing the march to begin and continue in the first place. 

The latest lament of people smarter than you is telling you what a happy marriage must and should be. This should come as no surprise to anyone, not just based on the drumbeat of behavior control that has been bearing down upon us for decades, but even more simple reasons; how many times have you heard some elitist snob analyze someone’s relationship with the snide comment, “well, they may be together, but they’re certainly not happy.” Or the always popular, “they have been together for a while but it’s not a healthy relationship.” 

Ahh, yes, the sweet smell of judgmentalism is in the air and its sights are aimed right at you and me. For decades we have been lectured about the breakdown of the American family and our values. Yet, the ridicule and scorn has never found just one solitary target; in fact, it’s never found a consistent one which has led to seemingly everyone being told that they are unhealthy, unhappy, dysfunctional and bad for the culture. It’s amazing to me any of us stay together at all. 

Think about it; if you stay together for the sake of the kids, you are dysfunctional. If you divorce for your own happiness, you are a “broken family.” If you break up, your marriage has failed, yet if you stay together, you aren’t really happy. We’re told that successful happy couples can and should disagree, but then we’re also told how we can and should fight. Yelling isn’t ok, name calling isn’t ok, physically aggressive behavior isn’t ok…what the hell is a fight? We’re told that if things get too heated we should “seek solitude and calm down before continuing the disagreement”, yet we’re also told that leaving the room during an argument is “running away from the problem.”  The greatest thing about experts is that they don’t have the slightest god damned clue what the hell they are talking about. 

Sadly, none of that stops society from creating what is called “a narrative,” which ultimately becomes the thing that people are told to say and believe. There is an acceptable way to be married, sadly, and it is defined in a way that no one can possibly achieve; not to mention there are plenty of people who would find society’s definition of an acceptable marriage to be totally dysfunctional. 

For those of you who are skeptical of the premise, equate it to parenting; there are a myriad of ways to raise a happy, healthy, functioning child. Some people use spanking, others use time-outs. The argument that one is better than the other when both are used in moderation is nothing more than closed minded judgmentalism; or, put another way, people demanding that you think the way they do. And what has happened in the past 4 decades in America? Despite the fact that almost all studies show that an overwhelming majority of Americans feel that spanking is an effective parenting tool when used in moderation, it is still demonized, looked down upon and defined in the “narrative,” as abuse.  

The vocal minority continues to win, and as a result, control. The latest proposal, already begun in failed foreign socialist countries and coming quickly to America, is to completely change our marriage laws.  This is being done under the guise of legalizing gay marriage. While we’re at it, they’ll say, let’s not only let gays marry, but let’s set up some rules and restrictions about how you should all be married. Here’s the basic framework:

 
- Marriage will open to anyone (for now) that meets the legal requirements.  

- Everyone will have to take “marriage therapy preparation” classes together and separately before being granted a marriage license

- Everyone’s marriage license will be good for 5 years. At that point, if you want to stay married, you have to complete another round of classes and tests. If you don’t want to stay married, you both just walk away; no harm no foul.

- After 10 years, you can choose to go through one more round of classes and tests and get your lifelong license. 

Color me single. Who of any self respect would put themselves through such torture and humiliation? Yet again, however, the idea is this; you don’t know how to be in a healthy relationship but the almighty town elders do. The great minds amongst us will teach you how to be married and then test you on your answers.

Incidentally, this would be just the beginning. Once such strict absurd notions are in place, it’s easy to restrict former felons, anyone accused of domestic violence and gun owners from getting married. And on and on the list would go until marriage was a unique, rare privilege reserved only for those that are most learned and distinguished amongst us; y’know, the elites. The snobs. The behavior control Nazis who deem that there way is the only way.    

After much waiting and anticipation, I have recieved my new FightPad for the X-Box 360.  Gaze in wonder at its awesomness.
 

 I finally achieved Nuke launcher status.  I dont boost to get my killstreaks either.  I get them Legit.  And I play TDM mostly, so getting the nuke was even more satisfying.  It took a score of 26 - 1 to get it.  It was the absolute best that I have ever played the game. 
 
Map: Terminal
 
Build  
Primary - ACR (Holo sight, FMJ)
Secondary - M1040 (Red Dot)
Semtex
Stun
Bling Pro
Stopping Power Pro
Ninja Pro
 
Killstreaks:
Harrier
AC130
Nuke
 
Method:
 I mostly prowled outside and in the airplane itself.  I never went indoors.  I took potshots from outside the bottom floor at the enemy until I got the harriers.  I unleashed them and quickly racked up the 11 kills necessary for the AC130.  I hightailed it to the back of the plane right behind the ladder and shot the enemy through the skylights until I was at 21 kills.  By this time the enemy was swarming around the plane.  I ran to the cockpit (he he...pit...) with my shotgun as I had no more ACR rounds and hunkered down.  One cannot go hunting with only a shotgun outdoors.  I managed to get the 4 kills that I needed to get the nuke.  The enemy kept spawning all around me.  I ran as fast as I could to the rear exit of the plane straight past 2 guys and set off the nuke.  No one chased me.  It was glorious.  The hoots and hollers from me team made it feel really good.  A nuke in a TDM.  Who would have thunk it.
 
Final Score: