What the Hell is Lamadjuret?

One of the reasons (there were literally thousands), that Superblog!! changed its URL is that nobody understood what "lamadjuret" meant. What is "lamadjuret"?!?, they would ask, tears in their eyes. And we refused to answer. But now that Bad Old Superblog!! is dead the conundrum can be resolved, the mystery revealed, the secret told, everything finally made clear as a pond of water on a sunny day:

"Lamadjuret" is Swedish for "the llama", or possibly "the lame animal", or maybe even (but probably not) "the lama-animal". Because, while Swedish is an expressive language, it also has relatively few synonyms. And the reason we (well, I) chose that name is because it was, quite literally, the first thing that popped into my head.

I had no idea then that the name is used by some kind of field hockey team, or whatever they are. Nor did I know that this team apparently sucks:

Det är bara att erkänna att Lamadjuret är sämst i serien. De hade inget spel alls, men otroligt tur. I alla fall deras målvakt som nästan inte ens visste vad han gjorde, men han fick bollarna på sig ändå.

Roughly translated into pidgin English:

It's just to admit that the Lame Animal is crappiest in the series. They had no game at all, but incredibly luck. In every case, their goalpostmankeeper, who nearly not did know what he was doing, but his balls were juicy.

Huh?! That doesn't make much sense, but it sure seems pretty bad. Is that a name we want Superblog!! to be assocated with? I don't think so.

Thus the URL change.


Superblog 2!! - A Billion Times Better Than The Old Superblog!!, And That's No Exaggeration!

Superblog!! is Dead, Long Live Superblog!!

Hey, we all knew this was too good a thing to last forever. Eventually Superblog!!, like all good blogs, had to grow up and leave home. We've been thinking of changing the URL for a while and, right around the same time, rightwing nutjob Uncle Sammy is starting to get restless, judging from this abusive post.

Thus I've decided it's time for a change, in the form of Superblog 2!!.

Superblog 2!! will be everything Superblog!! was, and more besides. And best of all, it's conveniently located at http://superblog2.blogspot.com! Go there now, and never leave. Never ever.

(The image above is courtesy of the Tombstone Generator)

Update: But you're already here, aren't you? That's because this post, and everything posted before it, was seamlessly incorporated into the new blog. If you want to visit the old Superblog!!, go to http://lamadjuret.blogspot.com! But that's really not necessary, because everything that's there is also here. Get it? Ha! Superblog 2!! rules!!

Rate this finger

The Iraqi vote was a success and I would like all you leftist fuckheads to shove your own finger up your ass. Do it! Do it NOW! If you got it properly jammed it's time to do some whining about one election not being democracy. Guess what? More democracy will come and all of you will resemble a bunch of fist fucked assholes.

Who is Mr William Cutya?

You know what? Of course you don't, I haven't told you yet. It's like this:

The creators of Superblog!! like to waste money on stupid electronic quiz games at stupid pubs in vain attempts at dethroning the reigning champions. This is our way of trying to prove that we're the smartest guys in Linköping (a pretty shitty city in Sweden). As can be seen from the picture above, this doesn't work, the reason being that when the idea hits us we're generally already inebriated. (Stupid Mårten! You're going down.)

To avoid being hunted down by fans, instead of using our birth names (Koala and Uncle), we go by the combined alias of Mr William Cutya, Esq.

So if you happen to be playing stupid electronic quiz games at stupid pubs one stupid night and you notice W. Cutya's name on the high score list... just walk away.

Update, Jan 31st: Somebody informed me today that "Mårten" doesn't exist but is just a name put on the list to trick people like me and Sammy into spending our hard-earned cash on the machine. I sure feel stupid now, though I guess the fact that Mårten is fictitious doesn't really change anything. He's still going down.

Warren Buffet richer than ever and actually looking a bit like Hans Blix

Super rich old crook Warren Buffett is getting both older and richer. Yesterday he made $645 million which is about half the GDB of Equatorial Guinea. Yesterday he was also one day younger. It all adds up somehow.
To read about the hardcore business you must visit cnnmoney.

Even for a billionaire like Buffett, who is one of the country's wealthiest men and one of the world's most widely followed investors, making more than a half-billion dollars is not bad for a day's work.

With $645 million you can:

Buy almost 645 briefcases containing $1 million each.
or
buy 430.287 nice looking 30" Widescreen LCD Flat Panel HD-Ready TV's.
or
buy around 14300 nuclear fallout shelters on 3.6 acres of wooded land in North Texas. (dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge)

Superblog!! - Your Time is Our Money!

Site of the Day: Scott McCloud Vs. A Bear!

Congratulations, Scott McCloud Vs. A Bear! You are Superblog!!'s Site of the Day for the day of November 14th, 1998.

If this wondrous site has a flaw (you'll notice I'm saying if), it's that anyone can vote as many times as he wants to. I myself voted 16 times, 9 times for the bear and 7 times for McCloud. This is likely to render the result dubious in some people's eyes.

As always, Superblog!! is much too busy to create an award pic for the winners to paste upon their sites, so instead we urge them to use anyone of these.

Hot and Spicy Election Day Special $4.99

The Iraqi election day is almost upon us all, including the people and insurgents of Iraq. Love is in the air and lots of other stuff! I stumbled across some voting instructions that made sense and would like to share them with the rest of the world (I am a very decent man).

If you wish to vote for the SUNNI candidate, you are asked to cast your vote by one of the following ways:
1) bomb a Shiite temple
2) assassinate a Shiite cleric
3) blow up an election hall in a Shiite neighborhood
4) all of the above.

If you wish to vote for an Islamic Terrorist candidate, (Al Qaeda party), you are asked to cast your vote by one of the following ways:
1) deliver the head of a US citizen to any voting location; (a Halliburton employee will be counted as TWO votes)
2) blow up a Sunni temple AND a Shiite temple, and deliver a videotape of the explosions to Al Jazeera.
3) Please come to Najaf or Mosul to be "counted"; wear a black mask and BYORPG (bring your own RPGs

If you are a shiite, a kurd and/or a curious person you oughta go to blogcritics.org and read the rest of it.

Site of the Day: Rate My Finger

Possibly the most useful website ever created. I mean, how often can you send the same few "fuck you" images to friends who piss you off online? Now you have a whole pile to pick from!

For that reason, we are honored to bestow upon this masterpiece the second ever Superblog!! Site of the Day award. Hooray.

Sadly, Superblog!! is much too lazy to create an actual award pic for the winners to paste upon their sites in order to inform the world of this miraculous event, so we urge them to use, say, this one instead.

Tell Me You Haven't Forgotten JibJab!

The 2004 Presidential election in the United States triggered an enormous amount of spoofs and humor pieces. Probably the single best satire I saw was JibJab's "This Land". It wasn't laugh-out-loud funny, but it was remarkably well done and, surprisingly, seemed to amuse Bush supporters and Kerry supporters alike. It was also a massive success, becoming one of those web phenomena that penetrates the mainstream media.

Since then, the JibJab team have continued making similar Flash animations. None of them are up to the standard of "This Land", but they're still kind of fun. Just recently, "Second Term" premiered. Check it out. (But beware of an annoying interface - popup upon popup.)


Superblog!! Says: "Brush Your Teeth After Each Meal!"

The Amazing Aviating Million Dollar Superblog!! (of Flying Daggers)

Hooray for Hollywood! It's Oscars time! And it's hobbit free!
My prediction is that 2005 will be the year of The Aviator. I've seen half of it now and it's not bad, can even turn out to be really good. We might have really good and we have big budget (112 million dollars), Scorsese and DiCaprio (their turn now) and above all: Mental illness!!!

As a young man, Hughes evidently contracted syphilis, and in his later years he was plagued with neurosyphilis, which is marked by a degeneration of brain cells that can lead to paranoia and other symptoms. In addition, as a test pilot Hughes was involved in numerous plane crashes that some researchers presume resulted in brain injury.

Bet you all a dollar! Mental illness is something they appreciate a lot in Hollywood...

Bad Taste or Cool Viral Ad?

Something that looks like a TV commercial for VW Polo featuring a suicide bomber is now circulating on the internet. Also circulating are the speculations about its origins. Is it for real or is it a viral ad? The good folks at snopes.com shows the clip and tries to sort it out:

So just who produced this offensive spot? The ad doesn't appear to be a spoof put together by some rogue amateur filmmakers, as its production values (e.g., shot on 35mm film, probably at a cost in the tens of thousands of dollars) would indicate. Paul Buckett, a Volkswagen spokesman, has denied that the automobile manufacturer had anything to do with it: [...] We were horrified. This is not something we would consider using: it is in incredibly bad taste to depict suicide bombers. It gives the impression we've condoned or supported it, and is potentially very damaging to Volkswagen. Our legal department is planning an action . . .'

Well, watch it and decide. Is it bad taste or is it fun? This time I'm voting for both. The real judge though - is YOU !

Bush's America: Kids Aged 9 and 10 Arrested for Drawing Violent Stick Figures

Yeah, it happened Monday in the proud state of Florida:

Two boys were arrested for making pencil-and-crayon stick figure drawings depicting a 10-year-old classmate being stabbed and hung, police said. The children, charged with a felony, were taken from school in handcuffs.

(Actually, the AP story is incorrect on the "felony" matter. The kids were suspended from school, but have not yet been charged with a crime. But still.)

From the Pulse:

"Welcome to the new reality," Executive Director of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund Charles Brownstein told the Pulse. "I get one of these every five or six weeks, like clockwork. Zero-tolerance policies are establishing a system that treats kids like criminals for being kids. What teenager doesn't harbor some violent emotions? Reasonable people recognize that drawing them isn't the same as acting on them, but the zero-tolerance policies, while understandable, are not reasonable.

This is apparently just the latest in a series of similar disturbing events. As Brownstein says, It's a weird, troubling trend.

In fairness to Dubya (who is implicated in this entry's headline), I should add that Florida actually went fascist during the Clinton administration - though back then they only arrested adults for drawing. In the 1990s, crappy cartoonist Mike Diana became the first American artist ever to be convicted of obscenity:

Diana was sentenced to a three-year probation, during which time his residence is subject to inspection, without warning or warrant, to determine if he is in possession of, or is creating obscene material. He is to have no contact with children under 18, undergo psychological testing, enroll in a journalistic ethics course, pay a $3,000 fine, and perform 1,248 hours of community service.

Get it? He was forbidden from drawing in his own home. That's sane.

God Bless America, and God Bless Superblog!!

Ted Turner madder than ever and actually looking a bit like Hitler

Ted Turner was ousted from Time Warner Inc. five years ago. I suppose he's still somewhat angry. This is some of the things he had to say when they let him out to speak at the National Association for Television Programming Executives' conference:

While Fox may be the largest news network [and has overtaken Turner's CNN], it's not the best, Turner said. He followed up by pointing out that Adolph Hitler got the most votes when he was elected to run Germany prior to WWII. He said the network is the propaganda tool for the Bush Administration.

A Fox News spokesperson: Ted is understandably bitter having lost his ratings, his network, and now his mind, we wish him well.

I beg to differ! Obviously Ted lost his mind years ago. You just need to google for a few seconds to come up with the "evidence" (It would take some psychiatrists and a thorough investigation to prove it beyond serious doubt) .

Reports of Turner's idiocy have become so frequent that they're arguably not even newsworthy, in a man-bites-dog sense. They're tiresome, really. Like shark-attack stories. Or Darryl-Strawberry-arrest stories.
In fact, in the very same interview in which he made the Israelis-as-terrorist claims, Turner tried to explain away his most recent faux pas, a February speech in which he praised the September 11 hijackers as "brave," although maybe a "little nuts."

Fine Art Action Figures

A Dutch studio is making little sculptures inspired by the work of famous artists like Klimt, Dalí, Beardsley and Degas.

With the greatest respect for the original works of art the designers of the Paratsone studios in The Netherlands have brought to live famous paintings by lifting images out of the flat surface.

And really, they're kind of neat. The coolest ones are doubtless those made from works of Hieronymus Bosch.

Buy me one for Christmas.

(Link via The Comics Journal message board.)

How Tall Are You and Why?

This blog points us in the direction of the Flash animation "Tall Or Not", which lets you compare your height with that of various celebrities. Now, this may sound pretty boring but I actually find it surprisingly enlightening.

For instance, I swear I had no idea that David Hasselhoff was taller than me (he's 6'4"). Now I have to alter my life accordingly.

According to Poll, Half of America is Stupid

You may remember that George Bush Junior promised to be "a uniter, not a divider" during the 2000 election campaign. So how did it turn out? A new poll shows that the United States is divided on the question:

On the eve of President Bush's inauguration, a poll shows the nation is split over whether he has united or divided the nation [...] Forty-nine percent of 1,007 adult Americans said in phone interviews they believe Bush is a "uniter," according to the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Wednesday. Another 49 percent called him a "divider," and 2 percent had no opinion.

The results nearly match those of a poll taken in October 2004, which showed 48 percent considered Bush a "uniter" and 48 percent called him a "divider," with 4 percent having no opinion.

Listen, it doesn't matter if you think Dubya is the greatest thing since sliced ham. If the country is diametrically opposed on the question of whether he's a uniter or a divider, then that very question has been decisively answered! You may still go on thinking that Dubya is a great president (while I'll continue to regard him as a spectacular failure), but Dubya being a "uniter" is demonstrably false.

So you can't call him that. It's against the rules. Get it?

Freedom is Just 1456 Days Away!

Peter David is a writer I have very little interest in, but he's taken an interesting initiative:

Since freedom is so important to the President that he felt the need to mention the word over two dozen times in his speech, we here at peterdavid.net felt that--in the interest of a new spirit of bipartisanship and cooperation--we should try to spread the concept of freedom wherever and whenever possible.

Hence the "Freedom Clock," which [...] will be ticking down the days, hours, minutes and seconds until this country is finally free of George W. Bush...barring premature departure such as impeachment or being tried for war crimes, or an extended stay should some bright Republicans try to repeal Section one of the 22nd Amendment (which I doubt they'd do since it would free up Clinton to run again, and they won't want to risk that.)

Bah, forget Dubya and Clinton. Sure, Slick Willy was cool, but if the 22nd Amendment is repealed, I know who I'd vote for. Ronald Reagan's corpse.

Anyway, the Freedom Clock is available here.

Jewish Kids Don't Know Where to Turn for Deviant Sex

The Kosher Eucharist writes:

Jewish, um, “superblog” Protocols has finally closed down [...] I’m, personally, very distraught. Where can I go now to find all the hot and extremely questionable news about the purported deviant sexual proclivities of prominent figures in American Jewish life?

I think we all know the answer to that question.


Superblog!! - The sole remaining blog for hot and questionable news about purported deviant sexual proclivities of prominent American Jews

I'm Leaving Now for Santa Fe

I'm leaving now in search for my inner self. If I survive
I will blog about my quest.
Strange worlds awaits me.

Most likely God hates us all and especially bloggers

So? God hates shrimp, fags, Swedes, Aboriginals and so on and so forth...
Since God is all and everywhere it's fucking totally obvious that he hates us all.

Support for my thesis is easy to find:

http://www.godhatesyou.com/

Where you can have you mail forwarded to... HELL!!

and

http://www.godhatesme.com/

Where you can have a look at Satans servant/The tool of God. Please try their poll to see if you are very good or if you must die instantly.

You've got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya punk?

Not exactly the kind of up to date news normally found on Superblog!! but still worth a line or two.

Clint Eastwood in a speech given like a week ago:

"Michael Moore and I actually have a lot in common - we both appreciate living in a country where there's free expression," Eastwood told the star-dotted crowd attending the National Board of Review awards dinner at Tavern on the Green, where Eastwood picked up a Special Filmmaking Achievement prize for "Million Dollar Baby."
Then, the Republican-leaning actor/director advised the lefty filmmaker: "But, Michael, if you ever show up at my front door with a camera - I'll kill you."
The audience erupted in laughter, and Eastwood grinned dangerously.
"I mean it," he added, provoking more guffaws.

The punk known as Michael Moore attended the dinner and yes, he was laughing too.

The Three Best Computer Games Ever

Superblog!! would like to apologize for not blogging yesterday. It's really too bad as this was the first day missed since December 12th. We even blogged on Christmas and New Year's, dammit! Well, let's just assume it was Sammy's fault and move on.

The headline of this entry promises the Three Best Computer Games Ever and that's what I'll deliver. Be quiet for a minute while I try to collect my thoughts.

Ah, here we go.

The Third Best Computer Game Ever: Trogdor!
You play a dragon, motivated by fear and rage. Your job is to kill peasants, but fascist knights try to destroy you!

The Second Best Computer Game Ever: Bush Shootout!
Speaking of fascists, in this game you play the President of the United States and Protector of the Free World, George Walker Bush. The White House has been invaded by terrorists and your job is to kill them. Guest-starring Condoleezza Rice (who will not be a presidential candidate in 2008, Sammy - no way).

And... the Best Computer Game Ever: Mario World Overrun!
Enemies of all shapes and colors are trying to destroy your precious castle (an obvious phallic symbol) and your mission, as usual, is to kill them. You have a variety of weapons at your disposal. I like to think of this game as a metaphore for the battle between the sexes.

Please play these games until painful rheumatism kicks in and your eyes and ears are bleeding. Thank you.

Fox Blurs Cartoon Ass After Being Fined for Showing Hot Women Licking Whipped Cream From Horny Strippers' Bodies and Sexy Sluts Spanking a Man

Yup. Fox recently blurred the butt of a cartoon character:

The latest example of TV network self-censorship because of FCC concerns came a few weeks ago during a rerun of a "Family Guy" cartoon. Fox electronically blurred a character's posterior, even though the image was seen five years ago when the episode originally aired.

This was without having received any complaints whatsoever. Admittedly, they did it after having been fined last year for airing a TV show with spanking, etc (as described in the headline). But still. What does this tell you about the cultural climate in Dubya's America?

This is disturbed. It's just a butt, people! And it's a cartoon!

Fucking puritans.

Superblog!! - You Come for the Hardcore Porn, You Stay for the Insightful Political Commentary

Norwegians Ask People All Over the World to Assassinate President Bush

As we've established, both God and Karl Rove hate Sweden. Sweden, for God's sake! A land that wouldn't hurt a fly! Why, we're so pacifist we even refused to take sides against Hitler! One would think nobody would even bother taking notice of us, let alone walk around hating us.

And all the while, a truly dangerous Scandinavian country continues to operate beneath the radar. I am, of course, talking about Norway, home of the famed website KillHim.Nu. ("Nu" is Norwegian for "now".) The site's banner asks, "Can someone shoot this man?"

Uh-oh. This just in: A minute after revealing Norway as America's true enemy, I realize Sweden might not be quite as innocent as I thought. Check out this subliminal message from Sweden's biggest tabloid:

I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and I will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.

Hmm. At least it looks like they're doing it to help America.

The burning Bush and other biblic adventures

Dear Dubya,

You held your inaugural speech ....

"We are led, by events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world," Bush said.

Bla, bla, freedom! Bla, bla liberty! We have heard it before...this is the alternative inaugural speech you should have picked instead.

My fellow Americans, I had intended to reach out to all of you and bring a divided nation together. But I changed my mind. America isn't divided by political ethos or ethnic origin. America isn't divided by region or religion. America is divided by jerks. Who wants to bring a bunch of jerks together with the rest of us? Let them stew in Berkeley, Boston, and Ann Arbor.

That speech was written by P. J. O'Rourke. He's funny, you're funny. Give him a call. Hire him.

Sincerely yours

Uncle Sammy
Superblog!!

Swedish Norwegian Mumbo Jumbo

So, Karl Rove hates Sweden. Who doesn't? I hope he has better jokes about the Swedes than the ones i could come up with. Hmm..he is known as the brain but you never know.

A swede was in a nightclub in New York, dancing with a beautiful woman. He whispered into her ear, "I love you." She smiled and whispered back, "I love you too!" There was a little pause, the swede was thinking, then he whispered, "I love you three."

There was this swede who once got home and found his wife in bed with another man. He was so angry that he got a gun and pointed it to his own head. "NO! Don't do that," his wife begged. "Shut up woman! You'll be next," the angry swede replied.

Karl Rove might have Norwegian ancestors but he should study some more so he could hate Blix in a more informed way. Listen to the real thing from a genuine Norwegian baby seal clubber.

If a well-informed person like Karl Rove does have a bad opinion of Sweden, it would be because of its neutrality during WW2, which involved turning back Norwegian refugees at the border (in the early part of the war), selling large amounts of iron ore to Germany, and granting passage for German troops into Norway. Contrasted against Norway's more courageous military and civil resistance, this part of Swedish history is looked down on in Norway. As well it should. The neutrality continued during the Cold War, and is part of the diplomatic tradition Hans Blix comes from, so in moderate amounts this would actually be a relevant grudge.


Swedes: Cooperating with nazis, laughing at Norwegian refugees and promoting French behavior. You just gotta hate them!

Bush Advisor Karl Rove Hates Sweden

It's "Hate Sweden" week here at Superblog!! so let's follow up yesterday's entry with a look at Mr Karl Rove, called "Bush's Brain" by some. (Direct link to movie trailer.)

Rove is one of the most influential people in the world, yet a surprising number of people have never heard of him. As the Guardian has it:

The nerdy political brawler with only a secondary school education is now the man the president likes to call his "boy genius" - a testament to Rove's role in orchestrating Bush's rise from a feckless, hard-drinking politician's brat to Texas governor to president in barely a decade. And unlike other electoral svengalis who have gone before him, Rove has carried his power intact from the campaign bus to the White House.

Just how powerful is this man? Well...

Rove's office is tight-lipped about the extent of his duties, but the few un-vetted memoirs to have escaped from this highly disciplined administration have all portrayed him as the single most powerful figure in it, with the (possible) exceptions of the president and vice-president.

Dubya and Rove go way back. While working for George Bush Sr in the 1970s, Rove met Junior, and it was love at first sight:

"Huge amounts of charisma, swagger, cowboy boots, flight jacket, wonderful smile, just charisma - you know, wow," Rove recalled years later. In 1977, Rove was sent to Texas, in theory to run a political action committee, but according to one Texan political consultant who knew him at the time, "It was really to baby-sit Bush back when Bush was drinking".

Karl Rove Fun Fact #1: Dubya has a cute nickname for his "brain":

"Turd Blossom" - a Texanism for a flower that blooms from cattle excrement.

Karl Rove Fun Fact #2 (provided by Wikipedia):

Karl Rove is known for his strong temper and use of profanity. A frequently cited example is "We will fuck him like he's never been fucked before."

Anyway, to finally get to the point: According to Bob Woodward's book Plan of Attack (as reported by Slate)...

Karl Rove, a Norwegian-American, is obsessed with the "historical duplicity" of the Swedes, who seized Norway back in 1814. This nationalism manifests itself as hatred for Swedish weapons inspector Hans Blix.

That's real rational of you, Karl! And hey, isn't it funny that it turned out that Blix was totally right and the Bush regime was totally wrong? I think it is.

Superblog!! - Historically Duplicitous

God Hates Sweden

Jesus Christ! I totally missed this a few weeks ago, so maybe you did too. From the Raw Story:

The Westboro Baptist Church leaders known for picketing the funeral of Matthew Shepard, the young college student brutally murdered in Wyoming in 1998, have released the following statement regarding the tsunamis which hit Southeast Asia earlier in the week.

The statement, which was posted on their website Wednesday alongside dozens of other archived "press releases," thanks God for the tsunami and for the death of any gay Swedish vacationers who perished at the time.

Apparently these lovely people have had it in for Sweden ever since the pastor Åke Green was sentenced to prison for hate speech against gays. Which means they're very happy now. Take it, compassionate Christians:

We sincerely hope and pray that all 20,000 Swedes are dead, their bodies bloated on the ground or in mass graves or floating at sea feeding sharks and fishes or in the bellies of thousands of crocodiles washed ashore by tsunamis.

Given the nature of this blog, I feel I have to point out that this is no joke - it seems that God really does hate Sweden. Why else would he have let so many Swedes vacation in the area? Then again, I guess we should be thankful he doesn't hate us as much as he must hate Indonesia and Sri Lanka.

Superblog!! - We Hate Sweden Too, But We Don't Brag About It

Laugh with Superblog!!

A lawyer, a priest and a social worker were fleeing the Titanic.
The social worker: "We must try and save the children!"
The laywer: "Fuck the children!"
The priest: "Do you think there's time?"

Nicholas Cage in search of happiness in a bottle

The unforgettable Ben Sanderson played by Nicholas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas works just fine as the illustration for todays boozing rules. That's what I thought before i found out that..............too many bloggers are already linking stuff from Modern Drunkard Magazine. I even did it myself.... once but never again!!!! If you are a serious drinker and wants to show your house guests your level of sophistication I suggest that you pre-order this book about boozing.

The Perfect Buzz : The Essential Guide to Boozing, Bars, and Bad Behavior
The Perfect Buzz is guaranteed to make you the life and soul of any bar or party -- from mixology and the delicate art of scoring to drinking games and bar etiquette.

You never know, it can be a good investment, but keep in mind that you can always ask your question about boozing here at Superblog!! And if you really, really are a serious drinker you don't need a stupid book to teach you anything.

Our beloved leader guides us in his second term.

It's one of those rare moments when i manage to read an article containing several paragraphs!
John Lewis Gaddis , Professor of History at Yale writes in Foreign Affairs about George W. Bush and his second term. The prof both criticizes and praises the administration of Dubya but since I am who I am it's gonna be an orgy in cutting and pasting stuff I like. (It's an article for all! Liberal bloggers can use it too!)

Perhaps al Qaeda planned no further attacks. Perhaps it anticipated that the United States would retaliate by invading Afghanistan and deposing the Taliban. Perhaps it foresaw U.S. military redeployments from Saudi Arabia to Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Iraq. Perhaps it expected a worldwide counterterrorist campaign to roll up substantial portions of its network. Perhaps it predicted that the Bush administration would abandon its aversion to nation building and set out to democratize the Middle East. Perhaps bin Laden's strategy allowed for all of this, but that seems unlikely. If it did not, then the first and most fundamental feature of the Bush strategy--taking the offensive against the terrorists and thereby surprising them--has so far accomplished its purposes.

No, no, no !! Usama is almighty, he has foreseen all of this..

There is still time, then, to defeat the insurgency--even though the insurgents are no doubt also learning from their own mistakes. Victory, in the end, will go to the side that can rally the "silent majority" of Iraqis who have so far not taken sides. Here an advantage lies with the Americans and their allies, for they can offer elections. The insurgents cannot.

Nope, the insurgents cannot even provide freedom, room service or anything else worth living for.

And yet, on October 9, 2004, millions of Afghans lined up to vote in an election that had no precedent in their nation's long history. Had anyone predicted this three years ago, the response would have been incredulity--if not doubts about sanity.

I predicted it and was brutally beaten by the liberal thugs of my home town. It was worth it.

What this suggests is that forces of disruption and construction coexist in Afghanistan: their shifting balance is beyond precise measurement. If that is true there, then it is all the more so in Iraq, where the contradictions are greater, the stakes are higher, and the standards for making optimistic or pessimistic judgments are even more opaque. The best one can say at the moment, of both countries, is that they defy generalization. That is less than the Bush administration hoped for. It is far more, however, than any previous American administration has achieved in the Middle East. For better or for worse, the status quo exists no longer.

Works for me. I have never liked any form of Status Quo.

Poland Must Never Be Forgotten

During the first presidential debate last fall, the following exchange took place:

KERRY: The United Nations, Kofi Annan offered help after Baghdad fell. And we never picked him up on that and did what was necessary to transfer authority and to transfer reconstruction. It was always American-run.
Secondly, when we went in, there were three countries: Great Britain, Australia and the United States. That's not a grand coalition. We can do better.

LEHRER: Thirty seconds, Mr. President.

BUSH: Well, actually, he forgot Poland.

Dubya's response might have been reasonable, if lame, if it had been true, but it wasn't. Since then, the phrase "you forgot Poland" (he slurred the first word slightly, causing many to mistake "he" for "you") has apparently developed something of a cult following, and made it into an online slang dictionary. Here's one definition:

A weak and desparate [sic] attempt to put positive spin on an obviously negative situation.

More amusing, though, is the website www.YouForgotPoland.com, which simply features a bunch of photo manipulations on the theme. Like the one above.

Thanks to David for bringing this important site to Superblog!!'s attention.

Israeli McDonald's Ad Spoofs Pulp Fiction

Continuing the theme of blogging about television ads for hamburger chains, McDonald's in Israel has launched a campaign that parodies the McDonald's dialogue in the movie Pulp Fiction. The McShwarma is made of lamp, because "a pig is a dirty animal", remember?

The ad is is not very funny, but it's slightly bizarre, and perhaps culturally significant. Direct link to the clip.

Footnote 1: From Israellycool:
For those not familar with Israel, the reason that the punchline in this commercial is so funny is that Israelis are not known for their "politeness" (although Israelis have hearts of gold). The commercial is thus a clever commentary on Israeli society.

Footnote 2:
Shawarma, (sometimes spelled as shwarma, schwarma or shoarma) is a Middle Eastern cuisine dish of fine ribbons of spicy lamb meat, similar to Greek gyros, Turkish döner kebab and Mexican taco al pastor.

(Oh, and here's recipe for Chicken Shwarma.)

Jesus Schmesus

If you are like me and get most of your kicks from randomly writing things in the address field of your browser... Chances are that you stumble across www.ilovejesus.com where you eventually will find some pretty darn good excuses for not letting Jesus invade your privacy!

I am a good person anyway, why do I need Jesus?
You found Superblog!! and have thereby already proven your qualities. Well done Sir/Madam!

I am too bad to be saved!
Yes, and bad equals fun. Do you really want to cancel all those future nights of bowling, babes and vodka galore?

I need to get some things straightened out before I get saved.
Indeed you do! Like exploring the sexual fantasies of Gummy Bears or you could finally have that Full-day ZERO-G Experience!! Keep in mind that Jesus has not to my knowledge ever approved of sexual fantasies or floating around naked in zero-g. Ergo, if Jesus does not approve of it, then you probably have found another thing you should get straightened out.

TV Ad for "Food Porn" Hamburger Features Fisting

A Slate columnist reports that a couple of American burger chains have produced somewhat sexualized TV ads for their product, attempting to target 18- to 34-year-old males. The image above is taken from an ad that Slate describes as follows:

A woman walks alone onto a featureless stage, wearing high heels and a dress … and proceeds to fist herself.

Actually, she shoves her fist into her mouth, indicating that she is capable of consuming "the largest double burger in the country". Here's the clip.

Another pair of ads in the same campaign demonstrate that, perhaps surprisingly, girls are much better than boys at stuffing their mouths with straw.

The product itself (press release) sounds delicious:

"Fist Girl" is for the Monster Thickburger, launched this past November. The Monster consists of two one-third-pound patties, three slices of American cheese, four strips of bacon, a slathering of mayonnaise, and a pair of buttered buns. That's 1,420 calories and 107 grams of fat.
[...]
The plain old Thickburger (the Monster Thickburger's smaller predecessor) was termed "food porn" by the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

Says the Center:

But if the old Thickburger was Food Porn, the new Monster Thickburger is the fast-food equivalent of a snuff film.

Yum. I'd sure like to try one of these.

Footnote: The headline of this entry is of course slightly misleading, as the term "fisting" is usually limited to... (Take it, Wikipedia):

human sexual behaviour that involves inserting the entire hand, and sometimes part of the arm, into the vagina (vaginal fisting) or anus (handballing or anal fisting) of a sexual partner. Fisting is also called fist fucking, sometimes shortened to "FF." The medical terms for these practices are brachiovaginal eroticism (vaginal) and brachioproctic eroticism (anal) respectively.

But don't do it the wrong way!

Despite its name, fisting does not involve forcing the clenched fist into the vagina or anus. Instead, all five fingers are kept straight and held as close together as possible (forming a beak-like shape), then the hand is slowly inserted into a well-lubricated vagina or anus. Once insertion is complete, the fingers either clench into a fist or remain straight.

Superblog!! performs a public service.

Superblog!! Recipes: Rotten Shark Meat

How to prepare rotten shark:

Take one large shark, gut and discard the innards, the cartilage and the head. Cut flesh into large pieces.Wash in running water to get all slime and blood off. Dig a large hole in coarse gravel, preferably down by the sea and far from the nearest inhabited house - this is to make sure the smell doesn't bother anybody. Put in the shark pieces, and press them well together.
[...]
Leave for 6-7 weeks (in summer) to 2-3 months (in winter). During this time, fluid will drain from the shark flesh, and putrefication will set in.

This process is necessary because sharks have a lot of urea in their blood.

Shark's blood may contain 2.5% urea in contrast to the 0.01-0.03% in other vertebrates. This high level makes sharks blood isotonic to sea water, so the shark lives in osmotic balance with its environment and has a kidney that functions like ours (with the exception that far more urea is reabsorbed in the shark's tubules than in ours).

Learn more about vertebrate kidneys here.

Thanks to Kristin for suggesting this subject.

See you in court

It's kind of rare for me to be rooting for a lawyer but this is such a time. Trial lawyer Ron Motley may have a good case.

According to the initial complaint, Arab Bank has funneled billions of dollars to Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and other terrorist organizations.

Why is It So Goddamn Hard to Send Your Loved Ones a Decent Clownogram in This Day and Age?

Would you believe that when you google for "clownogram" you get exactly one hit?

Give that Special someone a different kind of Birthday greeting they will remember for a lifetime. Bell E. Buttons will arrive at the Birthday persons home or office and recite a comical poem written especially for them. He or She will then assist Bell E. Buttons in a fun filled magic trick and be presented with a Balloon Bouquet and a Clown Helpers Certificate.

Sounds great, Mr Buttons! Sign me up! Googling for "clownograms" (plural) yields more, but crappier, results. (I did find a coupon that entitles you to $10 off one of Abby London's magic shows for children, but that's not what I'm looking for, damn it!)

"Clowngrams" (the singular yields nada), though, takes you to "Binky the Clown's Magic, Puppet, Juggling & Music Show !!!"

An interactive show that all the children
participate in. Starting at $80.*

* Ask Binky about adding Face Painting and
Balloon Animals for even more fun!

All this leads up to another interesting question: What the fuck am I doing with my life? I mean, googling for clownograms? What's that all about?

Long-Term Employee Fired for Blogging

Via Cory Doctorow and Neil Gaiman, among others, we learn that a guy who worked at a bookstore for 11 years was recently fired for occasionally blogging about work in a satirical manner:

Shortly before Christmas, in the spirit of that season, my manager at Waterstone’s asked me to come into the office. Within a few, short moments I was told that for comments I had posted on this web site I was now subject to an enquiry to determine if I should face a disciplinary hearing for ‘gross misconduct’ because I had ‘brought the company into disrepute’. I was informed (more than once) that this could cause my dismissal.

[...]

I am now free to discuss what happened for the brutally simple reason that Waterstone’s dismissed me from my job yesterday.

(This story is ongoing.)

And you know what? It turns out that a lot of people have been fired for blogging!

Unsurprisingly, this is something many bloggers feel very strongly about. (Nutjobs!)

Clearly Superblog!!'s contributors don't get the respect we're entitled to, considering what a hazardous field we're in.

Not a wave rat after all?

Did he cave? or was he genuinely good?

A woman who donated a coveted Web site address to what she thought was a fund-raising organization for tsumani victims claims she was scammed by a college student who tried to sell the domain for $50,000

www.tsunamirelief.com

She'll Take Your Breath Away

This post is dedicated, with respect, to all those who lost friends and relatives in South Asia.

Our thoughts are with you.

Gimme some fruit cake please!

Suddenly I felt this huge regret for ignoring the slice of people interested in bakery recipes. Now where's that cake??

Leftist heads rolling at CBS!

Judgement day is here. Not at Superblog!! We'll survive anything... It's at CBS they're chopping like crazy. The revolution is here...

By doing what needed to be done, as painful as some of these steps are, we hope to have moved decisively to set the record straight, and to turn this crisis into an opportunity to make CBS News stronger than it ever has been.

Yeah, pain is definitely involved in that kind of business.

If Dubya Did Not Exist, We Would Have to Invent Him

If, like the vast majority of people in the world, you're less than happy with the current prez of the United States, why don't you remodel him, like I did above?

Yes, that's right. Now you can build your own Dubya! Remake him into a sane and cool and competent person! Or just go nuts! Anything is possible! The sky's the limit!

Also available: former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.

Dubya and Bubba - Super Best Friends!

Wow! The picture says it all and this the rest.

For two men at opposite ends of the political spectrum, the relationship between the 43rd and 42nd presidents has grown surprisingly warm and personal over the last six months. Clinton endorsed Bush's approach to the tsunami catastrophe, defending him against criticism about his initial response as well as raising cash alongside the president's father. Friends and aides say the two men enjoy each other's company and, as fellow pros, respect each other's political talents.

It almost looks as good as in South Park ep 5-03 !


Jesus:
Stanley, I want you to meet some of the super best friends [they are shown when mentioned]: Buddha, with the powers of invisibility; Mohammed, the Muslim prophet with the powers of flame [he raises his hands palm up and a blast of flame emerges from each hand]; Krishna, the Hindu deity; Jospeh Smith, the Mormom prophet; Lao Tse, the found of Taoism [performs some martial arts moves with his cane]; and Sea-Man, with the ability to breathe underwater and link mentally with fish.
Stan:
So you mean to tell me that even though people fight and argue over different religions, you guys are all actually friends?
Mohammed:
More than friends, young boy, we are super best friends, with the desire to fight for justice.
Joseph Smith:
We all believe in the power of good over evil. Except for Buddha, of course, who doesn't believe in evil. [Buddha shrugs and grins]
Stan:
Wow.

In real life Dubya has the qualities of Mohammed. Bubba is of course like Buddha.

Chairman of Debt Reconciliation and Foreign Contract Payments of the Nigerian Senate Contacts Superblog!!, Asks for Help with Money Transaction

We've been receiving a lot of interesting offers by email lately, and I thought I'd share one of them, along with my response. Here is Senator Iya Abubakar:

Dear friend,

This short memo would certainly embarrass you due to the fact that we have not had any previous correspondence with each other. I got your details on the internet when I was on a desperate search for someone who could handle a big transaction for our mutual benefit. We shall get to know each other better pretty soon but please give this deal a serious consideration as it would certainly benefit both of us tremendously.

Yes, Senator, we certainly will. Rest assured that you did the right thing by contacting us.

One of our government contractor, who serviced a certain project for the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) at the Porthacourt Refinery lost his life on the September 11, 2001 at the World Trade Center during the Terrorist Bombing organized by the al’queda network of Osama Bin Laden.

Huh? Osama bin Laden? What are you talking about, Senator? I thought
Saddam Hussein was behind 9-11? Do you have access to information the rest of us haven't? Now I'm confused.

This contractor had left Nigeria for his country to produce certain documents required of him for the clearing of his funds which was routed to his account in Wellsfargo Bank through the Petroleum Trust Fund account of the Nigerian Government at our correspondent bank, the Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS AG, ZURICH). He however could not come back having met his sudden death on that trip.

Well, that's understandable.

The allocated funds for his contract payment has been at the UBS AG ever since due to the fact that the documents were never received coupled with the fact that he does not have any dependant (Next-of Kin). I now have plans of claiming this funds (together with all accrued interests) if I can find an honest foreigner who would be presented as the next of kin to the diseased.

Wait a minute. Is that even legal? And it sounds like you're leading up to asking Superblog!! to pose as a relative of that unfortunate man. I sure hope that's not where this is going, Sir!

My office has already forwarded our report to the Accountant General’s office with this claim one of those already settled. This goes to show that this deal is 100% risk free as the government have already noted the claim as settled. The amount in question is US$93,600,000 (Ninety Three Million, Six Hundred Thousand United States Dollars).

Oh. Still listening.

The continued stay of this money with the bank in Zurich does not make any business sense. It does not also make any business sense allowing this money to be sent back to the Nigerian government treasury, not paid to anyone when there are millions of people out there who are suffering some high degree of untold hardship. I would want us to claim this money and donate a substantial part of it to Charity. The rest can then be equally shared between the both of us.

"The rest"? Just how much are we talking about here? I wouldn't want to assist you in stealing, sorry, claiming all that money just to see 99 percent of it go to feeding hungry Nigerian children or something.

As the chairman of Debt Reconciliation and Foreign Contract Payments of the Nigerian Senate, I know how best to achieve this goal without leaving any traces. More details on this plans (including documents relevant to this claim) shall be forwarded to you upon your acceptance to collaborate with me on this business opportunity of a life time.

Superblog!! may very well be interested in collaborating with you in this endeavour. Please contact us with further information through the usual channels.

But please this deal must have to be conducted under a water tight (highly confidential) arrangement due to the sensitive nature of my official appointment.

That goes without saying.

Finally, please I urge you to get back to me even if you are not interested on this deal. Your response would allow me to decide on weather to continue prospecting for another collaborator or not. Just get back to me through this email address: sen_abubakar2000@yahoo.com. Thanks as I wait in anticipation for your response.

Best Regard,
Senator Iya Abubakar.

It's "whether", you moron! And is that your professional email address? I have to admit I'm not entirely convinced you're even a real senator.

Still, thank you for your letter. Superblog!! looks forward to hearing more from you on this matter.

UNfit!

The U.N. is a great organisation when it works but with the oil-for-food scandal not properly investigated yet it would be kind of nice if the U.N. could try to restrain themselves.. It doesn't seem like self-evident that the U.N. should handle ALL the relief for the tsunami victims.

Anytime a particular organization is aggressively pursuing control of a huge pot of money, we ought to be suspicious. But, in this case, the U.N. and its employees have an established record of mishandling and perhaps even pilfering large sums that were supposed to provide humanitarian assistance.

In other news, this IS getting headlines but imagine the size of those headlines if it was about US troops in Iraq.

From 72 allegations of abuse by military and civilian personnel, the OIOS was able to compile 20 case reports, of which one civilian case and six military cases were substantiated.
A French civilian staff member took pornographic photos of young girls performing sex acts and is facing prosecution in France after the U.N. sent him home.

Nazi Chocolate Balls?

Swedes love their chocolate balls but for decades they were referred to as "negerbollar" which translated to english becomes "negro balls". In the Swedish south there is this little town called Sjobo where they have quite a few racist hillbillies. At the café in Sjobo the following took place last year..

Stockholm - A baker's shop in Sweden has been reported for racial discrimination for selling a popular sweet by its traditional Swedish name - Negro ball.The Swedish news agency TT said a customer at the bakery in the southern town of Sjobo had reported the shop to the ethnic discrimination ombudsman after several complaints to staff failed to get a change in the pastry's name.

Was the owner impressed? No...

But bakery owner Agneta Andersson did not see a problem."I can't understand it. If a pastry is named after you, you ought to be glad. We've had pitch-black negroes in here who didn't complain," Andersson said.

The whole story reminds a little bit of things like this or this but we are talking Sweden in 2003 for Christ's sake!

Revealed at Last: Koala is a Funny Asian Man

Funny Asian Man


What's Your Personality Type?
brought to you by Quizilla

Update:


What does this mean? Your nerdiness is:

Not nerdy, but definitely not hip.

Matrix Trilogy Assistant Director to Butcher Another Alan Moore Classic

Alan Moore, probably the best comics writer who ever lived, doesn't want anything to do with Hollywood. In fact, while movies continue to be made from his work, he rejects all money from them, and assigns it to his collaborators on each project. Why? Neil Gaiman explains:

This was because he was deeply hurt and offended and irritated by being accused in the Larry Cohen lawsuit of having written League of Extraordinary Gentlemen as some kind of studio shill, and because Alan never does anything by halves. Up until the lawsuit his position was that he didn't care about the films people made from his work, but was happy to cash the cheques; after, he decided that he didn't even want to cash the cheques.

He hasn't even seen The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen - or From Hell, another big-budget movie recently adapted from his work. And that's probably for the best, as the movies are nowhere near as accomplished as the original comics. Considering the depth, originality, and technical brilliance of the sources (particularly From Hell), that the movies are standard Hollywood pap is... well, unsurprising, but still slightly offensive.

From Hell the movie was an extremely dumbed-down version of Moore's story. I haven't seen The League, but by all accounts it was a complete bastardization of the concept, and pretty much a turkey.

Ironically, after Moore made his announcement earlier this year, movies made from his work have started coming fast and furious. Constantine, starring Keanu Reeves, is finished, Watchmen is on its way, and now V for Vendetta has been officially announced.

The Wachowski Brothers and Joel Silver, the creators and producer of the revolutionary, $1.6 billion-grossing "Matrix" trilogy, will unleash the action thriller V For Vendetta for Silver Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures, with Natalie Portman ("Star Wars: Episodes I-III," Closer, Garden State) set to star.

Joel Silver. Jesus Christ.

Constantine would also seem to suck, considering that the studio's first decision was to transform the title character - a sarcastic, blond, working-class Liverpudlian - into a dark, brooding American.

Watchmen is unfilmable, as the most interesting thing about it is Moore's use of formal techniques unique to the comics medium, stuff that is literally impossible to transfer to the big screen. That one of the main characters is naked throughout might also be problematic...

V for Vendetta is actually, Joel Silver's attachment notwithstanding, the only one that has a sporting chance of being any good at all, but I wouldn't hold my breath. Read the comics instead.

By the way: Can someone explain why "VE" is circled in the poster's logo above, instead of just "V"?

Role Model Prints Inflammatory Posters Urging Children to Metaphorically Assualt Asian Population

Advocating this?

Holy crap! You might be right Koala in your comparision between USA and Norway. But it strikes me that you fail to mention that Norway does not like USA have a Pacific command. USA are contributing good taxdollars by sending stuff like this.

INDIAN OCEAN -- At the request of the Government of Indonesia, the Okinawa-based 3rd Marine Division, as United States Support Group - Indonesia, is providing humanitarian assistance and disaster relief to the people of Indonesia who were affected by the recent earthquake and subsequent tsunami. USSG-I is currently coordinating the relief efforts underway by the USS Abraham Lincoln, and deploying 400 Marines, 6 CH-46 medium-lift helicopters and other engineering and medical equipment aboard the USS Fort McHenry from Okinawa to Indonesia in support of on-going relief operations.

I guess that you could include that and still find Norway to be more generous in THIS matter. Australia is now the leading country concerning the tsunami relief. My point was that all in all, USA are contributing more aid than any other country. Your opinion that you still should have a saying in how USA spend other money reminds me about pure and evil communism.

If the USA is the Dad of the World, It's a Deadbeat Dad, Prone to Violence

Some people seem to have missed the point of this entry. The point was not that the United States spends too little on foreign aid but that it invests vastly more in a stunningly unpopular war. Since the United States is by far the richest country in the world, imagine the difference it could make if its leaders were genuinely interested in bettering the world, rather than making sure Halliburton executives have enough ivory back-scratchers.

But calling the United States "the most generous country in the world" is plainly ridiculous.

According to the World Bank, the United States had a Gross National Income of 10,945,792 million dollars in 2004.

Norway's GNI in 2004 was 197,658 million dollars. Which is about one fifty-fifth of the USA's.

And now you're trying to tell me that America contributing $350 million to tsunami relief is more generous than Norway contributing over $180 million? Excuse me?

Credit where credit is due, for fuck's sake. God bless Norway.


Footnote: I should add that I haven't been able to verify the numbers used in my co-blogger's post, and, in fact, some of them strike me as pretty unlikely. If it turns out they were fabricated, Superblog!! will of course be discontinued.

USA, Dad of the world

That's comedy! Of course USA is to blame one more time! It must be absolutely forbidden to check other countries efforts whatsoever.. Take a view at this.

The latest official statistics show that, so far, Saudi Arabia has pledged $10 million, the small Gulf state of Qatar has promised to donate $25 million, the United Arab Emirates is offering $2 million and Bahrain another $2 million.
In contrast, Norway is contributing more than $180 million, Britain $96 million, Sweden $80 million, and Denmark $55 million to tsunami relief.

It is time for these countries to step up their support too. Perhaps it is tasteless to jump at any other country than USA?

Columnist Charles Krauthammer:

"We are six percent, or less, of the world's population," Krauthammer told his fellow "Fox News Sunday" panelists. "We give almost half [of the global foreign aid]. ... We give 60 percent of all the food aid on the planet." And that's not all: "We maintain a military infrastructure that keeps the peace in the world," he noted. "We are the only people who do that."
"It's simply irresponsible to talk about the United States as anything other than the most generous nation in the world," Krauthammer said.

The problem is that even if USA gives the most AND are ridding the world of dictators.....for some it's just never enough.

The Cost of War: US Tsunami Aid Amounts to Less Than Two Days in Iraq

This is something a bunch of blogs have commented on this morning, but it's too amusing a comparison for Superblog!! to ignore.

Cory Doctorow points to Frank Boosman, who has done the math:

[...] the total amount committed by the US government to date for tsunami relief -- $350,000,000 -- equals 42.27 hours of the cost of the war in Iraq. Just to put things in perspective.

Initially, the US committed only a tenth of that sum, $35 million, which, according to The Nation, is $5 million less than the planned expenditure for Bush's inauguration on January 20th.

The war in Iraq has - as of this writing - cost the United States over $148 billion , which could have fully funded global anti-hunger efforts for 6 years or world-wide AIDS programs for 14 years, or immunized every child in the world for 49 years. Again, just to put things in perspective.

But hey, at least the war got rid of Saddam, so life must be pretty sweet in Iraq now, right?

All kidding aside, I recognize that a lot of the people who support the Iraqi endeavour do it because they genuinely (if, IMO, very naively) think it is a Good Thing, something that will create a better life for a bunch of people. The vast majority of reports from Iraq would seem to contradict that assumption. But regardless of where you stand on the issue, the war is a very costly gamble. Meanwhile, there are tons of ways that money could have been used to actually create a better life for people.

If that was a priority for the Bush administration, I mean.

Which it's not.

Because the Bush administration are assholes.

Bruce Willis, you retard!

Actor Bruce Willis said something back in 2001 about not doing any more action movies.
Uhu? What has he been up too ever since?

Romantic movies?
Making porn?
Serious acting?

Maybe I can forgive him for some of it but not all!!! We'll see...
Mr Willis, this is how my mom said that God treated liars.

The Hollywood tough guy claims he was hit in the forehead by a 'squib' - a device used to create the effect of bullets hitting the ground - while filming an action scene for 'Tears of the Sun' in 2002.

UPDATE: Hat-tip to David for bringing this to the attention of Superblog!!

Classics May Help Ape Conquer World, Part Two

I'm guessing this is a reprint of the previous one. Or maybe their are lots of comics about gorillas conquering the world aided by Stevenson, Defoe and Melville, and these two are just scratching the surface. What do I know? I'm just a guy with a blog.

Correction: a guy with a Superblog!!

(Alternate title for this post to maximize readership through search engines: "GIANT ape reads Moby DICK".)

Classics May Help Ape Conquer World, Part One

Breaking News: Kids Today Use Inexplicable Language

Case in point: 14-year-old Aaron from Singapore:

sigh...sch has started and lessons beings , im bored wif life and now im bored with school. this moring i saw a very cute teacher! bet shes new and 19 this yr...
found out tt the ''gangsters'' in my class were not really tt bad... in fact...they are really just acting like gangsters..im suce an asshole. sleep through amost all the lessons. we had a new chinese teacher. she sucks. ALOT. the good thing is tt i was reading always and smsing and she dun give a damn. chem was super boring..the librarian was my chem teacher..she's as boring as her books!

Texas Girl Wants to Experience Movie-Style Love

Don't worry, Nichole. You'll meet someone!

I want someone who I never fall out of love with--who I'm in the honeymoon stage with after 10 years of marriage. Someone who makes me feel like a 10-year-old girl who got a note from a cute boy. I know your probably thinking, where in the world did this come from??? Well I went and saw Ladder 49 last night, and it just made me realize how much I want the love that is in that movie. Don't get me wrong, like I was telling Amber the other day, I am very glad I dated and had my fun.

Beckham, water and soft drinks

The Swedish tabloid Aftonbladet reports that a new commercial from Pepsi will be cancelled. For obvious reasons the efforts of Pepsi and David Beckham, Ronaldinho, Thierry Henry, Roberto Carlos, Raul, Fernando Torres och Rafael van der Vaart will go unnoticed this time. I guess they were lucky at Pepsi cause what Aftonbladet says (in Swedish) is that it was quite close that this one went on air. (Btw, if you feel that your Swedish is a bit rusty then this is what you need.)

Hmmm.. this almost resembles...a previous post.

You Can't Treat Me Like That!

Polite Dissent hands out the 2004 awards for the Best and Worst in Comic Book Medicine. Actually, it's limited to American "mainstream" comics (= two companies publishing superheroes), but that makes it even more amusing:

Worst Doctor:
Worst doctor not in terms of evilness, but in terms of apparent medical ability. This year’s winner is Dr. Mid-Nite. When he wasn’t bungling an autopsy, he was mistreating a heart attack (JSA #62), leaving stitches in a dirty wound (JSA #65) or handing out controlled substances like candy.

For shame! Clearly "Doctor" Mid-Nite's license should be revoked. The only physician I trust is Doctor Crocodile.

Speaking of comic book doctors, let me emphatically state that Doctor Doom's home country is not located in the Baltic states! Don't let anyone tell you it is.

Hey, this post is just weird.

It's Memory time

Today I bring you a little something from my treasuries. A photograph of The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall. The pic is taken like 1990 and is totally copyrighted by yours truly, Uncle Sammy. (Picture taken with some cheap ass instamatic for around $30.)
You see? You see? At Superblog!! we are productive artists and aren't just living from other peoples stuff, but let's do that too. Today we remember veterans and the man born exactly 424 years ago in 1581, Bishop James Ussher, Archbishop of Armagh. He sure made some serious accomplishments!

While Archbishop of Armagh, Ussher became determined to approximate when the universe was created. He traveled to Britain and Europe in 1640 trying to seek the earliest available manuscripts he could find. He decided to use the Book of Genesis to determine when he thought the universe was created. After counting the “begats” of the Book of Genesis, Ussher came to the conclusion that the universe was created at 9:00 am on the twenty-third of October, 4004 BC. This date was in fact used in some editions of the King James Version of the Bible.

Superblog!! It's fun and you learn stuff!

"WTC Go Bye Bye"

As Rich Johnston reminds us (somewhere in the middle), Marvel Comics abandoned their failed first attempt at a "fake manga" imprint in 2004. And now they're probably glad they did. If they had been publishing comics under this imprint today, it would most likely have seemed in very poor taste.

As Johnston says,
It would have been like having an imprint called World Trade Center Go Bye Bye three years ago.

Incidentally, why not donate today?

Site of the Day

Hi, fans. Just wanted to say that Iraq is a quagmire and that Bush is a horrible president. Here are one thousand reasons why (actually 1597 as of this writing).

But really I wanted to hand out Superblog!!'s first Site of the Day award. Aaand the winner is:

http://www.ffoff.com

Quite unexpected, huh?

Stupid is as stupid does

Looking into the wisdom of Google-answers reveals the following

Forrest's version of the saying means that stupidity is not just a
surface thing derived from a person's appearance. Stupidity is a
matter of deeds, not looks. Like the other versions, it comes down to
this: judge people by what they do, not by how they appear.

I readily admit that Dubya looks stupid from time to time. Most of us would do so occationally with a camera stuck up our face nearly 24/7. Let's have a look at his deeds and see what can be learned..

In Iraq 26 millions has been liberated from the dude who really can aspire for the nutjob title and Iraq seems to be the major example for the liberal left to shout about. In the words of Ralph Peters:
And it’s about power. Had Bill Clinton invaded Iraq and deposed Saddam, the Left would have cheered their throats raw, praising him as one of history’s greatest liberators. The rhetoric about Iraq isn’t about justice, or the Iraqi people, or even about the horrors of war.

Sure you can find ugly news about what's happening in Iraq and if you try a little harder it's also possible to find the better news. Chrenkoff is the man who makes it easy.

Iraqi refugees in Iran chooses to repatriate. It seems to me that many prefer Iraq "under Bush" compared to Iraq under Saddam...

Since last year, more than half of all Iraqi refugees in Iran – an estimated 107,000 people – have returned to their homeland. Most of them have gone back of their own accord, some 12,500 with UNHCR assistance. The rate of departure has been even higher among refugees staying in camps, with more than 80 percent of them choosing to repatriate.

How does the Iraqi people view the future? Like leftwing liberals? Not so...

More than 71 percent of those polled said they "strongly intend" to vote, and 67 percent said they believe Iraq will be ready to hold elections by the end of January, compared with 24 percent who said the country won't be ready.

Just a few words about another of Dubyas deeds (ok, he didn't do it alone), Afghanistan. Talibans are going down, education, rebuilding, economy and education are on its way up. Read more about it by visiting Mr Chrenkoff again. Yep, he covers Afghanistan too.

The slogan of http://www.afghan-web.com/ which i assume was born after the liberation:

"Afghanistan: The Friendliest Country in the World, Possibly the Universe."

Newsflash! Some Bloggers Support the Worst US President Ever!

Okay, so maybe that's not news.

Here's some random thoughts on blogs, media bias, Michael Moore, and GWB. This was originally supposed to be published as a series of articles in the New York Times, but they tried to censor me, so I thought, "Why not run it in Superblog!! instead?"

I consider extremely partisan sites and blogs, like some of the ones my co-blogger recommends, to be fairly useless as news sources. Personally, I prefer to get my news from sites that at least strive for objectivity, instead of taking a blinkered view of reality on purpose. Even then, though, I don't automatically trust everything they report. Because the media ("mainstream media" as well as "the blogosphere") shouldn't be trusted. Everyone has an agenda.

But that doesn't mean that there isn't a vast difference between, say, CNN and FOX News. Some media outlets can be trusted more than others. Conservatives like to answer the frequent criticism that FOX News is extremely right-wing with the charge that "CNN is left-wing". It's not, though. It's very far from left-wing. Regardless of its missteps, CNN at least tries to achieve some kind of balance (and they have erred on the right-wing side just as often as on the left-wing). Only an idiot would say that CNN is comparable to FOX News. One reports news, the other is pretty much propaganda. Both have a very pro-American perspective - naturally. If you can't see that, you leave me no choice but to mentally place you in the same category I reserve for Creationists and other Muppets.

And let's talk Michael Moore. While I disagree with Moore on a lot of things, if I have to choose between Moore himself and the legions of frothing Moore-haters, Mike's my guy any day of the week (I don't mean that in a homosexual sense... OR DO I? Just kidding). Thankfully, I don't have to make that choice, as it's quite easy to avoid both pro- and anti-Moore sites.

Moderate Conservatives tend to equate Moore-haters with Bush-bashers. While the groups' tactics can be very similar, there's a crucial difference between Michael Moore and George W Bush. Michael Moore is not the President of the United States. Although Moore is very famous (especially for a documentary filmmaker) and admired (especially outside the US), he is not in any way on an equal footing with Bush II. Michael Moore does not run a nation of 300 million people, of which a sizable number are fundamentalist nutjobs. (To be fair, a sizable number are of course not.)

If the media shouldn't be automatically trusted, that goes double for the President. I think it's the duty of citizens to question their leaders, regardless of which party they happen to represent. Anyone who is in the White House should be given a hard time. (Certainly Bill Clinton was, even though his "crimes" pale in comparison to Dubya's.)

Having said that, this particular President is different from most. Not only does he have a horrible track record, he actually thinks he was told by God to run for President. That's insane. Don't you feel safe at night knowing that the person in charge of the most powerful country on Earth, let alone over 10,000 nuclear weapons, is in direct communication with the Lord?

I know I do.

Viva animals!

In the aftermath of the the tsunami it has been proved that:

Elephants are good.

Six jumbos, who featured in Oliver Stone's recent blockbuster "Alexander," were trucked in from an elephant camp in the ancient capital Ayuthaya, 500 miles north of shattered Phuket island, to help speed up the search operation.
"We use the elephants because a truck can't pass through the thick forest," said trainer Laitonglian Meepan as he yelled commands at the giant beasts to move through the thick mangrove.
"The elephant is like a four-wheel drive. They walk in the forest all their life."

Dogs are good too.

"That dog grabbed me by the collar of my shirt," the boy said from under some trees at Pondicherry University, where the family is waiting for relief. "He dragged me out."

Human beings are as always both good and bad.