Mushtown Media Corp.

MMC IS GETTING POLITICAL AGAIN

For starters, I am linking My Left Wing to THE GORONS, a cartoon I drew a few weeks ago making fun of the Gore-Haters and their incessant silliness. After I posted it, I found out that the Gorons has already been used as the name of an alien race in a video game called The Legend of Zelda. It is also used by the Gore-Haters to designate us looney lefties who like Al Gore. (You can also view THE GORONS at Daily Kos.)

After six months of sporadic posts about James Bond, I have decided that MMC will be getting a little more political again. I reviewed An Inconvenient Truth last month because I thought it was an important film about an important issue, and it reminded me of the 2000 election, and the so-called Liberal Media peddling loads of bullshit about Al Gore, and the continuously frustrating reality that we have had five and a half years of Republican misrule when we could have had five and a half years of Albert Gore as president. It is just stunning that there are so many people running around who think George W. Bush is a good president. And just as stunning are the number of people who, even if they are stubbornly admitting that George W. Bush might have been a mistake, are suggesting that neither Kerry or Gore would have been better.

Get a clue, people!

I got a response from a fellow calling himself Rodger Schultz and I think he must be related to Sgt. Schultz (from Hogan's Heroes) because he knows nothing. He has a blog called Curmudgeonly and Skeptical and I looked at it for a minute trying to figure out what his deal is. He links to Free Republic. That's all I need to know.

In his comment to my review of An Inconvenient Truth, he denied that conservatives have ever said that Al Gore is a liar:

I think you're confused. We conservatibe nut cakes assert that Al's boss, and his wife, are pathological liars, not Al himself. We think he's insane. Please correct.

Yes. Al Gore is insane because ...

Uh.

A little help here, Sgt. Schultz. People aren't insane just because they disagree with you. They also aren't insane just because you say so. How about something resembling an argument?

He provides a link to an article from the Canada Free Press, which can be read here. The article was written by Tom Harris and sources the work of Australian scientist Bob Carter, both of whom have connections to think tanks that are funded, at least partially, by oil companies.

So, I guess Sgt. Schultz thinks that "insane" describes anyone who doesn't get their opinions pre-approved by oil companies.

(See here, here, and here for a Daily Kos discussion on Harris and Carter.)

I wrote about a lot more than global warming in my post on An Inconvenient Truth but Sgt. Schultz doesn't seem to have read the whole essay. He saw that I approved of the film and he just had to interject and show me the error of my ways with that Harris article, which he must have thought was particularly devastating because he hasn't come back to check in and offer any supporting talking points just in case I countered his silly nonsense.

I'm pretty sure he won't be back.

The whole incident energized me to get involved again. There are still too many people who are falling for Repug bullshit, who offer up really lame rationalizations when they are challenged, who slink away and won't engage when their silly and divisive talking points have been effectively refuted. I have had a break of several months from this day to day nastiness, and the Repugs are still a pack of nasty liars with no honor, no decency, no consistency, no honesty. It's time to jump back in and help to put the failed ideology of conservatism in the junk heap of history where it belongs, and where it has always belonged.


JOE LIEBERMAN: HE PUTS THE VICHY IN VICHY DEM

Joe Lieberman. I can't stand him. What a putz.

And I am not alone. Lots of Democrats are pissed at this man who claims to be a Democrat at the same time he takes great joy in repeating many of the same lying Repug talking points that make Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney so horny. Yes, it's true, we despise him, but it's not because of his anti-war stance, despite what the Liberal Media (TM) may be telling you.

Vincent Amoroso, of Boxborough, Mass., summed it up very well in a response to the L.A. Times editorial I linked above:

Re "Lieberman's run," editorial, July 6

Lieberman is not the victim but the perpetrator of a jihad against dissent. Other Democratic senators have supported the war without alienating the Democratic base.

What's different about Lieberman is his willingness to attack other Democrats and label their dissent on the war as treasonous. "It's time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge he'll be commander in chief for three more critical years, and that in matters of war, we undermine the president's credibility at our nation's peril," the senator said. Karl Rove could not have written a more shameful slander against Democrats.

(For other letters responding to this column, click here.)

Lieberman is seeking to be Connecticut's Senator for six more years, but he is facing a strong challenge from fellow Democrat Ned Lamont in the August 8 primary. Many Democrats across the nation are watching the race closely, and many of us are stunned at just how bad Lieberman is in so many ways, much worse than we suspected.

Here is the Daily Kos Search Page on Joe Lieberman for starters. I mean, there is just so much to chose from, it is hard to single out a mere two or three artcicles.

Lieberman and Lamont debated a few days ago. Lamont was very nervous against the veteran politician, but he got better as the debate went on. Lieberman was a dick, attacking, lying, interrupting. Lamont said "Let me talk. This isn't Fox News, sir." The Fox News remark is in the second link.

See the Daily Kos debate threads here, here and here.

If you want to see what David Brooks had to say in support of Lieberman, click here, where you can also read how the Kossacks tore his little bitch ass to pieces.

Lieberman ran an ad with cartoon bears that made no sense ... even after seasoned veterans of Connecticut politics explained it to us. The Kossacks really made fun of it. Oh, how we laughed! It was almost as bad as the Repugs' "wolves in the woods" ad in 2004.

Of course, the worst move by Lieberman was his threat that he would defect from the Democratic Party and run as an Independent if he doesn't get his way. Dude, if you don't want to be a Democrat, just quit now! I'm fine with that, Loserman.

This is the man that cost Al Gore the presidency and saddled us with the fart bubble who currently sits in the Oval office.


ARE ALL CONSERVATIVES IDIOTS OR JUST THE ONES WHO VOTE?

This is some crazy nutjobbery, and it really highlights why I just can't have any respect for conservatives.

The New York Times travel section ran a story on an exclusive Maryland town and mentioned that President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld have homes there. The article had pictures of Rumsfeld's home.

The conservative blogosphere went ballistic! The New York Times has a vendetta against Cheney and Rumsfeld, they said. The Times revealed where they live because they want Osama bin Laden to find them and kill them, they said.

It got ugly and awful, one of the worst displays of conservative hatred and bile that I have ever seen. Hordes of conservative commentators and their brain-washed minions started spewing out talking points and lame rationalizations in a manner almost unprecedented. They posted the phone number and address of the photographer and said that was the same thing as putting a photo of Rumsfeld's house in the paper. (When someone pointed out that Rumsfeld has Secret Service protection, one very clever wingnut said that the photographer could buy a gun. (Yup. Exact same thing.)) And so on and so on.

Then it turned out that the government had given permission for the New York Times to run the story.

Lots of apologies from the right-wing assholes who love George W. Bush?

Nope.

See "Right-Wing Blog Asks Readers to "Hunt Down" Info About NYT Editors' Children" at Daily Kos.

And see "Malkin, Powerline, RedState, FrontPage, Newsmax Promote False Story: Still No Corrections", also from Daily Kos.

And for the best ridicule of these conservative fucktards that are a horrifying embarrassment to all decent Americans, check out what Sadly, No had to say.


LARGELY GRATUITOUS DIG AT DEAD REPUG SAINT
(NO, NOT KENNY LAY)

I probably linked to this two years ago when it was timely, but I accidently came across Greg Pallast's obituary of Ronald Reagan and I decided to link to it for no good reason.

I admit it. I hate Republicans. Just like all good Americans should hate liars, thieves and thugs who look at the hole where the World Trade Center used to be and think of it as a perfect opportunity to slander their political opponents.

Yes, I know I promised that I would review Thunderball - the movie - next, but I picked up The Spy Who Loved Me - the book - at the library so that I would have it after watching Thunderball. And I haven't had time to watch Thunderball, BUT I started reading The Spy Who Loved Me on the subway and on my lunch hour and now I'm done with it and I need to review it.

The Spy Who Loved Me is a very satisfying departure for the James Bond novels. Bond doesn't appear until the novel is well underway, almost two-thirds of the way through the book. He has a very big supporting role, but the heroine is a young Canadian woman named Vivienne Michel, and The Spy Who Loved Me is told in the first person, a sort of memoir of some bad trouble she got into while working at a motel hidden among the pine trees in upstate New York.

It's very suspenseful, quickly read, a real page-turner, and it shows Fleming was capable of mixing it up a bit and providing some variety for James Bond fans. The heroine explains her background, a couple of love affairs gone bad, and her decision to put the past behind her. She decides to drive a scooter from Canada to Florida, with no rigid agenda, getting odd jobs along the way. She ends up all alone at Dreamy Pines Motor Court, somewhere between Troy and Albany, when the gangsters show up and start terrorizing her. Her attempts to escape are thwarted, and she is very confused by their motives. (Which turn out to be perfectly believable.) And then Jams Bond shows up, completely by coincidence. Ever since the conclusion of Thunderball, he has been tracking SPECTRE and Blofeld, and he had been following up a lead in Toronto. After that little adventure, he headed south and got a flat near the motel, and he shows up just in time to help Vivienne.

The movie with the title The Spy Who Loved Me has nothing to do with the book, and it was the very first Bond film written completely from scratch. Legend has it that Fleming really didn't like this book very much, and he claimed that he didn't write it; it had been on his desk one morning, written by Vivienne Michel. I liked it! And I'm not sure Ian Fleming really had such a low opinion of it. I suspect that he was just going along with the book's premise and playing a little literary prank when he claimed he didn't write it.

The Spy Who Loved Me is almost totally free of Flrming's quaint social notions, but this made me raise my eyebrows a bit:

All women love semi-rape. They love to be taken. It was his sweet brutality against my bruised body that had made his act of love so piercingly wonderful. That and the coinciding of nerves completely relaxed after the removal of tension and danger, the warmth of gratitude, and a woman's natural feeling for her hero. I had no regrets and no shame. There might be many consequences for me - not the least that I might be dissatisfied with other men. But whatever my troubles were, he would never hear of them. I would stay away from him and leave him to go his own road where there would be other women, who would probably give him as much physical pleasure as he had had with me. I wouldn't care, or at least I told myself that I wouldn't care, because none of them would ever own him - own any larger piece of than I now did. And for all my life I would be grateful to him, for everything. And I would remember him forever as my image of a man.

For more on The Spy Who Loved Me, check out the wikipedia entry.

THE JAMES BOND EXTRAVAGANZA CONTINUES!

COME WITH ME TO DISCO VOLANTE!

I'm not going to say too much about Thunderball - the words. It's a smashing good novel with no quaint notions about race and homosexuality to mock and deride. So there isn't too much to say except to give a brief synopsis, link to wikipedia, and offer up one blockquote about James Bond's views on - women drivers.

A NATO jet plane carrying nukular missiles turns up missing over the Atlantic and James Bond is sent to the Bahamas to follow up on a very slim lead. Among the many eccentric adventurers in the islands is Emilio Largo, a man of mysterious wealth who is about to take his customized yacht to look for sunken treasure. Of course that could just be a very clever cover story for someone who is about to go and salvage a missing NATO jet carrying nukular missiles!

His customized yacht, by the way, is the Disco Volante, which is Italian for "Flying Saucer." How could he be an international criminal when he names his yacht something dorky like that?

This is the novel where Fleming introduced the international criminal organization known as SPECTRE, which stands for (deep breath) the Special Executive for Counterintelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion. (Which actually spells SECTRE.) This is the only novel where Fleming used SPECTRE, possibly because he could never remember what the acronym stood for and he was too lazy to look it up.

This is also the first appearance of the Grand Poobah of the Bond villains, Ernst Stavros Blofeld, who would appear in two more of the novels and a bunch of Bond films.

It's a pretty good book as Bond (with the help of Felix Leiter) plays detective, follows up every little clue and scrap of information, and eventually foils the evil plans of SPECTRE!

To find out more about Thunderball, check out the wikipedia entry.

The girl is an Italian who hangs out with Largo and pretends she is his niece. Her name is Domino. She has a great monologue where she spends about three days talking about her obsession with the design on the Players cigarettes packet.

Bond is impressed with her driving skills, prompting this soliloquy:

Women are often meticulous and safe drivers, but they are very seldom first-class. In general Bond regarded them as a mild hazard and he always gave them plenty of road and was ready for the unpredictable. Four women in a car he regarded as the highest potential danger, and two women nearly as lethal. Women together cannot keep silent in a car, and when women talk they have to look into each other's faces. An exchange of words is not enough. They have to see the other person's expression, perhaps in order to read the other's words or to analyse the reaction to their own. So two women in the front seat of a car constantly distract each other's attention from the road ahead and four women are more than doubly dangerous, for the driver not only has to hear, and see, what her companion is saying, but also, for women are like that, what the two behind are talking about.

But this girl drove lika a man. She was entirly focused on the road ahead and on what was going on in her driving mirror, an accessory reraly used by women except for making up their faces. And, equally rare in a woman, she took a man's pleasure in the feel of her machine, in the timing of her gear changes, and the use of her brakes.

I was certain she was going to turn out to be a lesbian and that Bond was going to cure her. But no. Just a regular straight girl who likes to drive.

Ian Fleming was growing up!

NEXT: Thunderball - In pictures!