OK, Carlson, You Got Me

 

Is this not a recipe for man-parts melanoma? (or other calamity)  I asked myself, agape and aghast at the genital microwaving (this link is cursed) I saw displayed. I mean, dudes looking to procreate wear loose boxers and try to give their boys air if they are having some difficulties, so treating your hotdog to the convenience store lamp treatment in order to boost vitamin "D" seems entirely counterintuitive (read: stupid as fuck). Frankly, the best things you can do to boost test (non-pharma) are get good sleep, eat good food, move your ass, and don't be stressed out as all fuck. You know what else boosts test? Winning at actual stuff, instead of being the kind of guy who obsesses over whether you are manly or not. 

Gronk gets it. Beckham does, too. You are more than the sum of your hormones or social drag. 

I am not going to ask myself if the intro cut was homoerotic, because worrying about that is far more the Dan White Society's president's problem than mine. And I find I do not care what Pee Wee Better in the Original German thinks about gender stuff, since he once described beating up a gay person in a men's room, and it sort became a thing conservatives worry about in bathrooms now, and want to persecute non-gender conforming people about in public restrooms because ack!--weird when people need to pee, right? Because maybe sex stuff? (Actually, not really. It just gets talked about.) 

This man is so insecure he needs a passcode to grab his own dick in the john. This man is so insecure he supports pedophilia so long as it's the straight, very religiously-perversely-defended kind. (And women who own their own sexuality are whores. That's another extremely insecure thing.) 

So yes, I find I need to mock Carlson because wow, this thing was so needy and so totally about his own toxic masculine gender conflict, but it feels like he totally laid it out as bait so gender-wise hipsters would skewer him and martyr his poor UV rayed in effigy man-bits with opprobrium that he could then point to the mean-ass libs as the witches who were stealing his penis? 

Shut up you guys, I'm just a feminist asking questions.  And yes, I did the cock-robbin'. In the rest room with the lead pipe, And I would do it again! 

The Smokin' Crater Party

 

Marge Greene says in 2022 she is going to “blow away the Democrats’ socialist agenda,” then blows up a car with “socialism” on it with a 50-caliber rifle she is auctioning off for contributions. pic.twitter.com/b10wGwVVW2

— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) September 18, 2021

I'm not brand new, so I know that one of the points of an ad like this is outrage and getting liberals to point to it and here I am, Pavlov's liberal, pointing. Does she even have to run ads in her extremely red district? (But of course, shhhh, this is about fundraising and whatnot). But leaving aside the Palin-crosshairs-style violence indicated and the McCarthyist claim of anything she doesn't like as socialism, and it's really just distilled trolling. Because she believes trolling is her job.

No kidding. She recently told Steve Bannon that she's the "most effective member of Congress." That's objectively nonsense. She lost her committee seats. She's responsible for no legislation. What the heck is effective--did she mispronounce "defective"?  But she trolls and gets a response. It doesn't have to be a good response. 

Not every Republican trolls at MTG's level, but they all have the same basic idea of what governing is about--do stuff libs hate, but do things that are actually...useful? No. Absolutely not. So if Governor Abbott in TX wants to concentrate on the border instead of the power grid, or MS Gov. Reeves acts bemused when challenged on his state's lousy COVID-19 numbers, it's makes sense to realize that the ad above is the goal. Ask not what good government can do for you, ask what you can do to troll the libs. 

And you get to "govern" over a smoking crater for your trouble. 

The Only Orange Muppet I Fully Stan

Of all the absurd 2018 things to happen, one of the best Philadelphia-flavored ones has been Gritty, the mascot of your (my) Philadelphia Flyers. I haven't actually actively followed the team since the Legion of Doom days, but have stayed an admirer in absolute principle, as I have for the Iggles and the Phils, because it is my duty as a homer and because "No one likes us."  Indeed, Gritty became my red-headed brother despite what I thought at first was a corny, googly-eyed misfire--people outside the city called him out. 

Bitch, that's our corny, googly-eyed mascot. You get back in line. 

And then he got co-opted as an Antifa icon. 

Better yet, something about Gritty being Antifa in the local political culture (Philadelphia is demographically brown, resolutely Democratic, fiercely working class and eccentrically progressive--with dashes of old-school racism and class war getting their ass regularly kicked) pisses off the people who by all means, need something to piss them off and entertains the people who need to add humor to their activism. 

Twitter has embraced the orange-bearded hero we all deserve:

Gritty will not fight your wars of empire pic.twitter.com/JSXgcTIMms

— Fellow Worker Gritty (@FellowGritty) October 7, 2018

Gritty is one of us. Late for Occupy, but not too late for the assizes to come. I don't expect a stadium of orange-jerseyed sports fans to switch in their preference from "God Bless America" to "Bella Ciao" anytime soon. 

But we have a mascot. And as we are the City of Brotherly Love, he is also with you. Join us, you have nothing to lose but your chains.