THE MASSACRE
Yes folks, on this day we commemorate the relationship;
...no not the one your involved in,
but the historic relationship between Al Capone and Bugs Moran.
This is the single most contrived holiday ever invented
for the purpose of picking pockets and advancing consumerism.
The orthodox method of celebration however
is to purchase some item which is then exchanged for sexual favors.
This of course is completely different from prostitution.
Of course it is.
I imagine we all have our own ways of celebrating,
I for instance will stimulate the Mexican economy with the purchase of a fine bottle of tequila.
Which brings us to considering for a moment
Freud's contribution to buffoonery-
"The great question - which I have not been able to answer is, - What does a woman want?"
- Sigmund Freud
With romance and conspicuous consumption in the air,
it seems Freud's "great question" has finally been answered!
(By buffoons of course!)
The answer is in "the Kabakoff Affair".
(No, it's not bad episode of "The Man From U.N.C.L.E.")
Robert Kabakoff was riding his bike in Central Park while listening to tunes on his MP3 player one day. He passed a young woman who was sunbathing with her skirt hiked up and her derriere fully exposed. Kabakoff snapped a photo to document the "happy ending" with his cellphone from a polite distance (the bike path, 15 feet away). Another woman with our bare bunned sunbather noticed and took offense. The police were called in and Mr. Kabakoff was handcuffed, arrested, and spent the night in jail.
Apparently there is a law that, according to the New York Daily News outlaws "unlawful surveillance". This is a felony in that jurisdiction. Naturally, this "unlawful surveillance" concept only applies to private citizens as the local government allows itself a Larry Craig wide stance when it comes to surveillance latitude. As part of the patriotic paranoia offered up as a "solution" to religious extremists hi jacking airplanes, New York City has been involved in a government surveillance scheme known as the Lower Manhattan Security Initiative, which involves the installation of about 3,000 surveillance cameras and 100 license-plate readers in the business district south of Canal Street. Apparently, no one seems to oppose this extreme level of government intrusion. After all, as Randy Newman pointed out in A FEW WORDS IN DEFENSE OF OUR COUNTRY "A president once said We have nothing to fear but fear itself... now we are told we should be afraid, it's patriotic in fact, color coded...)
BUTT some fellow taking a photo of a girl who chose to present the patooti, exhibit the anterior, reveal the rump, bare the booty, uncover the can, and otherwise brandish her gluteus maximus in a public place is considered a clear and present danger by local authorities.
What a weirdo wonderland we have created.
Is Bloomberg BEHIND this?
The National Buffoon will get to the BOTTOM of this issue!
Admitedly, Kabakoff's behavior was tacky, a social faux pas.
Yet there's nothing intrinsically abusive about taking a picture in a public space,
especially if the particular subject of the photography is treating the public to generous views of her mudflaps. Not to be insensitive, but privacy in a public park is quite limited to say the least. Surely many passersby observed the caboose that day – Kabakoff merely recorded the event for posterior, er, posterity.
Kabakoff has sued the city, and in an uncommon display of common sense, they settled the suit and dropped the charges.
All's Well That ENDS well
Kabakoff received $8,000 as settlement and left for a European Vacation.
I hope he didn't bring his camera.
So to answer Freud's question. "What does a woman want?"
A women wants you in handcuffs.
HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!
The National Buffoon spotlights...what else?BUFFOONS.
Not just any ordinary run of the mill buffoons mind you,
but extraordinary buffoons!
From the pompous executives at Decca records,
Mike Smith and Dick Rowe who claimed
"Guitar groups are on their way out"
while passing up signing the Beatles in 1962,
to the engineer at the Advanced Computer Systems at IBM who said
"But what ... is it good for?" in 1968, commenting on the microchip.
If electricity comes from electrons, where does morality come from... morons?
And why is "bra" singular and "panties" plural?
Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible crisp,
which no decent human being would eat?
And why on earth are instructions needed on shampoo?
Buffoonery is nothing new. It is a time honored tradition.
A closed mouth gathers no feet.
There is an Assyrian tablet dated at 2800 BCE.
It says- The Earth is degenerating today.
Bribery and corruption abound.
Children no longer obey their parents,
every man wants to write a book,
and it is evident that the end of the world is fast approaching.
" Cardinal Bellarmine, in a Letter to Foscarinin, April 12, 1615 wrote-
"First, . . . to want to affirm that in reality the sun is at the center of the world and only turns on itself without moving from east to west, and the earth . . . revolves with great speed around the sun . . .is a very dangerous thing, likely not only to irritate all scholastic philosophers and theologians, but also to harm the Holy Faith by rendering Holy Scripture false. Nor can one answer that this is not a matter of faith, since if it is not a matter of faith "as regards the topic," it is a matter of faith "as regards the speaker"; and so it would be heretical to say that Abraham did not have two children and Jacob twelve, as well as to say that Christ was not born of a virgin, because both are said by the Holy Spirit through the mouth of the prophets and the apostles."
What a buffoon.
"To throw bombs from an airplane will do as much damage as throwing bags of flour. It will be my pleasure to stand on the bridge of any ship while it is attacked by airplanes."
Newton Baker, US minister of defense (1921)
What a buffoon.
"I have traveled the length and breadth of this country
and talked with the best people,
and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that won't last out the year."
Prentice Hall, editor in charge of business books, 1957
What a buffoon
I suspect we are all buffoons,
some perhaps more given to slaphappy activity than others.
But as we stumble through our lives,
from time to time we trip over some remarkable insights,
giving the impression that we are not chowderheads.
But the truth is we are indeed both fools
and trenchant sophisticates in our own ways.
Even August Comte, the French Philosopher
who created the Law of Three Stages,
which states that a society is a whole,
and each particular science,
develops through three mentally conceived stages;
Theological Stage, Metaphysics or Abstract Stage,
and the Positive Stage
(known as Positivism: which emphasized reason and logic)
managed to fire this one off-
"Every attempt to employ mathematical methods in the study of chemical questions must be considered profoundly irrational and contrary to the spirit of chemistry.... if mathematical analysis should ever hold a prominent place in chemistry -- an aberration which is happily almost impossible -- it would occasion a rapid and widespread degeneration of that science."A further proof of man's dual nature follows:
"Radio is just a fashion contrivance that will soon die out. It is obvious that there never will be invented a proper receiver!"
Thomas Edison
"640Kb ought to be enough for anybody."
Bill Gates, 1981
"Everything that can be invented has been invented."
Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
Ken Olson , President, Chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977
"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction."
Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872
"Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau."
Irving Fisher, 1929
"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value."
Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre.
It's Deja Vu All Over Again
Employees who didn’t meet their credit quotas risked complete humiliation. They had pies thrown in their faces, were forced to push peanuts across the floor with their noses, and were sent through hotel lobbies wearing only diapers.
Eager to avoid such total embarrassment, store managers gave credit “to anyone who breathed,” including untold thousands of customers who were bad risks. W.T. Grant racked up $800 million worth of bad debts before it finally collapsed in 1977. Seemed like a good idea at the time. So much so, numerous financial institutions have since adapted and tried to perfect the process!BUFFOONS ON THE MARCH
Former Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien discoversthat it's very hard to look cool if your in charge of the military
and you wear your helmet backwards.
"Death has a tendency to encourage a depressing view of war."
- Donald Rumsfeld
"I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we're really talking about peace."
- George W.Bush
"The difference between Sly Stallone and me is I am me, and he is him."
- Arnold Schwarzenegger
Pardon me, but your Freudian slip is showing
Sometimes we have what is referred to as a Kinsley Gaffe or "Washington Gaffe".
Telling the truth by accident.
When a politician says something inadvertently in public
which he or she privately believes to be true,
but which he or she would ordinarily refrain from saying publicly
since he or she believes the statement would be politically harmful or damaging.
The term comes from journalist Michael Kinsley,
who famously said, "A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth."
He first coined the term in The Guardian on January 14, 1992.
"We are trying to get unemployment to go up, and I think we're going to succeed"
--Ronald Reagan
"The Holocaust was an obscene period in our nation's history. I mean in this century's history. But we all lived in this century. I didn't live in this century."
Former Vice President Dan Quayle, Sept. 15, 1988
"I stand by all the mis-statements that I have made..."
-The American former Vice President Dan Quayle
has been a leading buffoon for quite a while now.
The man was born with his foot in his mouth.
"I have no problem communicating with Latin American heads of state
- though now I do wish I had paid more attention to Latin when I was at school."
On another occasion he told befuddled Western Samoans:
"You all look like happy campers to me.
Happy campers you are, happy campers you have been,
and as far as I am concerned, happy campers you always will be.
Then he told passing mourners at a funeral to "have a nice day".
Margaret Thatcher once addressed a meeting:
"It is marvelous to be back in Malaya"
The only trouble was that she was in Indonesia.
Kenneth Clarke, the former Tory Chancellor,
while addressing a group in Consett in March, 1995
said
"At Consett, you have got one of the best steelworks in Europe.
It doesn't employ as many people as it used to because it is so modern."
(The factory had closed it's doors in 1980.)
As if that weren't enough to convince the people of Consett
that Clarke knew little of their plight and cared less
he further insulted them by saying...
"Consett is also one of the major centers for disposable baby nappies (diapers)."
That factory had closed down four years before Mr Clarke made the speech.
U.S. President Nixon landed at a Norfolk air base in the late 1960s
and publicly praised "Prime Minister Macmillan".
Harold Wilson was Prime Minister.
Even Brits, who are known for keeping a stiff upper lip,
must find it trying to stay in form on occasions like these.
A year or two later, Marshal Tito, the Yugoslav leader arrived at Heathrow,
walked straight past Prime Minister Edward Heath,
who had his arm outstretched in welcome,
and shook hands, instead, with his baffled chauffeur.
James Watt, an oil company lawyer,
who Ronald Reagan sardonically appointed Secretary of the Interior
said he had formed an advisory group comprising
"a black, a woman, two Jews and a cripple - and we have talent".
Anyone not insulted yet?
The undefeated chump, er,chimp, um, champ...yes champ
of course
needs little introduction.
The Former President G.W. Bush
"The same folks that are bombing innocent people in Iraq were the ones who attacked us in America on September the 11th." -- Washington, D.C., July 12, 2007
"You know, one of the hardest parts of my job is to connect Iraq to the war on terror." --interview with CBS News' Katie Couric, Sept. 6, 2006
"I'll be long gone before some smart person ever figures out what happened inside this Oval Office." --Washington, D.C., May 12, 2008
"And there is distrust in Washington.
I am surprised, frankly, at the amount of distrust that exists in this town.
And I'm sorry it's the case, and I'll work hard to try to elevate it."
--interview on National Public Radio, Jan. 29, 2007
"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful,
and so are we.
They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people,
and neither do we."
--Washington, D.C., Aug. 5, 2004
(Watch the clip)
Bush also said
"You can fool some of the people all the time,
and those are the ones you want to concentrate on."
"The problem with the French is
that they don't have a word for entrepreneur."
(entrepreneur, is of course; a French word.)
HEY REPUBLICANS!
DON'T FORGET TO DONATE TO THE BUSH LIBRARY!
Dear Fellow Constituent: The George W. Bush Presidential Library is now in the planning stages and accepting donations.
The Library will include:
1. The Hurricane Katrina Room, which is still under construction.
2. The Alberto Gonzales Room, where you won’t be able to remember anything.
3. The Texas Air National Guard Room, where you don’t even have to show up.
4. The Walter Reed Hospital Room, where they don’t let you in.
5. The Guantanamo Bay Room, where they don’t let you out.
6. The Weapons of Mass Destruction Room, which no one has been able to find.
7. The National Debt Room, which is huge and has no ceiling.
8. The Tax Cut Room, with entry only to the wealthy.
9. The Economy Room, which is in the toilet.
10. The Iraq War Room. (After you complete your first visit, they make you go back for a second, third, fourth, and sometimes fifth visit.)
11. The Dick Cheney Room, in the famous undisclosed location, complete with shooting gallery.
12. The Environmental Conservation Room, still empty.
13. The Supreme Gift Shop, where you can buy an election.
14. The Airport Men’s Room, where you can meet some of your favorite Republican Senators.
15. The Decider Room, complete with dart board, magic 8-ball, Ouija board, dice, coins, and straws.
The library will also include
many famous Quotes by
George W. Bush:
1. ‘The vast majority of our imports come from outside the country.’
2. ‘If we don’t succeed, we run the risk of failure.’
3. ‘Republicans understand the importance of bondage between a mother and child.’
4. ‘No senior citizen should ever have to choose between prescription drugs and medicine.’
5. ‘I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy - but that could change.’
6. ‘One word sums up probably the responsibility of any Governor, and that one word is ‘to be prepared’.’
7. ‘Verbosity leads to unclear, inarticulate things.’
8. ‘I have made good judgments in the past. I have made good judgments in the future.’
9. ‘The future will be better tomorrow.’
10. ‘We’re going to have the best educated American people in the world..’
11. ‘One of the great things about books is sometimes there are some fantastic pictures.’ (during an education photo-op)
12. ‘Illegitimacy is something we should talk about in terms of not having it.’
13. ‘We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur.’
PLEASE GIVE GENEROUSLY!
Sincerely, Jack Abramoff: Co-Chair
G.W. Bush Library Board of Directors
"I couldn't imagine somebody like Osama bin Laden understanding the joy of Hanukkah." --GWB at a White House menorah lighting ceremony, Washington, D.C.
Though we are all mere buffoons passing through the sands of time,
some are nothing more, passing gas and wasting time.
Wouldn't recognize a glimpse of truth if it fell on them.
They are The Buffoons Extraordinaire.
The Elite Republican Guard of trumpery.
The laurel wreath of subnormal ignorance rests proudly on their swelled heads.
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