Remind Me Again...

... why we don't have effective gun-control policies in this country?

In the last 24 hours, we've had shootings in Kent, WA, Grand Prairie, TX, and Orlando, FL, resulting in -- at last count -- twenty-one injured and five killed. This is in addition to the usual shootings that don't make national news.

Now, the NRA crowd claims that "iffin ever'one carried, we wouldn't have none o' these sittawations, cuz the law-bidin' folks would gun down them nig...err, Islam.... err, bad guys."  Texas has a huge percentage of gun nuts; where were they?  I thught the whole idea of having armed lunatics gun down the bad guys was to prevent the armed lunatics from gunning down the good guys.

How much you want to bet the shooters will be more right-wing Christianist-fundamentalist whack jobs like Gerald Loughner?  I mean, face it, we DFHs don't go on shooting sprees... that's the job of the Bible-thumpin', hooker-humpin', sister-marryin', rifle-rack-in-the-pickmup neocon wingnut idjit crowd.

Long Time, No See

...Although perhaps not long enough for some people...

I haven't been blogging for a number of reasons:

• Lack of time (still only working two days a week, but the fire department, rescue squad, and some other commitments are keeping me busy)
• So thoroughly disgusted at the political system (local and national) that I want to spit
• Not a whole lot to say that hasn't already been said by others (f'rinstance, BadTux)

I spent three weeks in Joplin, MO, with the Red Cross, doing medical outreach in the impacted areas of the city.  Quite a learning experience.  I've been through my share of hairy, nasty situations, but never have I seen such complete devastation as I did in that poor city.  On the other hand, the spirit of the folks in Joplin isn't defeatist.  Hell, it's just barely bruised.  Those folks are some tough old Midwesterners, I'll tell you that.

The job situation sucks, as does the economy.  Screw you very much, Mr Preznit Shrub with all your tax cuts for the wealthy, to "create jobs." Create jobs, my fat ass.  The only jobs created have been for defense lawyers, Mergers and Acquisitions types, and pool boys.  Oh, and the resorts where the banks invest their TARP funds.

It's hard to be creative or even coherent -- never mind amusing -- when you're wondering if you're going to be able to pay the car insurance.  And before the Tea Baggers start hootin' 'bout "iffin y'all caint afferd it, y'all shouldn't be drivin," a vehicle is an absolute necessity in Maine.  There is no public transportation ouytside of the three largest cities.  Even our frickin' state capitol doesn't have bus service.

We're surrounded by the brain-dead morans of the Tea Bagger movement here, along with their hangers-on, the birthers, creationists, and all the rest of the scum.  We even have the John Birch Society making a come-back (buncha racist motherfuggers that they are).

Only passably-good news is that the pets are doing okay (remember the mandatory pet-blogging?  Yeah, what we haven't done in like three years).  Emily the Labrador and Joey the cat adjusted well to the new 618Rants World HQ in Maine.  We even adopted a certified pre-owned cat for the Crazy Cat Lady In Training... err, the lovely yet talented Mrs618.

Some of my favorite bloggers have retired, most without notice. Just stop by their blog one day and realize it hasn't been updated in 2 years (which makes me feel a little better).

Politics doesn't change, it still attracts the slimy, the scuzzy, the corrupt.  Law enforcement still attracts the power-hungry, the "big-gun-making-up-for-the-small-dick" crowd, business still attracts the "screw you, I got mine" crowd. Rethuglicans are still lying, cheating, whoremongers, and the Biblt-thumpin', hooker-humpin', sister-marryin', rifle-rack-in-the-pickmup neocon wingnut idjit crowd are still mouth-breathing in-bred "Deliverance" NASCAR gun nut fruitloops.

I can't wait to wake up and find the whole last 11 years has been a horrible nightmare.

I feel kinda like Bob Newhart, in the "Newhart" 20th anniversary show: "I dreamt I ran a Vermont inn..." before Larry, Darryl, and Darryl step out of the elevator.

Fat-Ass Paul LePage Chronicles, Part 5

Fat-ass Paul LePage, who said last week that a pro-labor mural mural in the Department of Labor building does not complement the department's "pro-business mission," had the mural removed over the weekend.  It seems LePage's actions were based on one -- count 'em, one -- anonymous fax from "a secret admirer."  Probably his equally fat-assed daughter, the ex-junkstore cashier now making $41,000 a year as special deputy fat-ass assistant to the chief of staff.

As Bill in Portland, Maine pointed out in his column last Friday on the Great Orange Satan:

Like Governors Scott Walker (WI), John Kasich (OH), Rick Snyder (MI) and Rick Scott (FL), LePage is recklessly overreaching, believing that there's some kind of tea party safety net underneath him that will catch his fall.  All of the governors cited above are watching their popularity sink like a stone, and I have no doubt that the next poll released about LePage will show similar results.

I think he may well be right.  A number of far-right wing whackjobs here in my general area -- the ones who voted for Fat-ass because he was "gonna cut all them 'titlements and dump all that librul crap" -- are now starting to regret having voted for Fat-ass.  Several doctors were initially proud of having voted for Fat-ass, based on his promises to cut government spending. Trouble is, the spending he wants to cut is medical reimbursements... to the doctors... who say (in effect), "Hey, don't cut MY payments, cut someone else's!"

And yet, these folks don't realize that Fat-ass is doing exactly what he promised he would do: eliminate every aspect of life in Maine that was not pro-big-business.  From Day One of his campaign, he made it clear his only constituency would be big business.

Kinda hard to have any sympathy for folks being screwed over by someone who promised to screw them over if given the chance.

Fat-Ass Paul LePage Chronicles, Parts 3 and 4

More from the fat-assed one...

I. Fat-Ass Paul LePage and State Employees

Not wasting any time in getting down to dirty dealings, is he?

The internal memo written last month by LePage spokesman Dan Demeritt said the LePage administration "will put 11,000 bureaucrats to work getting Republicans re-elected."

Demeritt said the memo was not meant to be taken literally.

Yeah, right.

As the Great American Philosopher said, "who ya gonna believe, me or yer lyin' eyes?"

II. Fat-Ass Paul LePage and State Unions

Like his teabagger compatriot in the Midwest, Fat-Ass Paul LePage is trying his hand at union-busting, demanding that state employees give up virtually all their hard-won collective bargaining rights.  This would be things like vacation, insurance coverage, fair pay, safe working conditions... all the stuff Fat-ass Paul LePage hates.

Fat-Ass Paul LePage Chronicles: Part 2

You know, this fat-assed loser is starting to make Gee-Dumbya, Beck, Rush Limpdick, and the rest look sympathetic...

The walking, talking douchebag, in his never-ending effort to make Maine "business friendly" -- primarily by screwing you and me -- is now talking about overturning a ban on a known carcinogen.  He says:

"...if you take a plastic bottle and put it in the microwave, and you heat it up, it gives off a chemical similar to estrogen. So the worst case is some women may have little beards."

God forbid anything should stand in the way of executive compensation, shareholder dividends and campaign contributions.

To borrow a concept from "Sadly, No"... shorter LePage: "Who needsyour health when I have power and money?"

Fat-ass LePage Chronicles, Part I

I have a feeling I'm going to be doing a lot of writing -- a whole, big, pee-pot-full of writing -- about Fat-as Paul LePage, so I figured I might as well create a tag for it now.

Fat-ass Paul LePage and the Environment

Fat-ass Paul LePage proves once again that he is every bit as venal, corrupt, incompetent, and uncaring as his intellectual hero, gee-dubya bush.

In his latest push to make Maine friendlier to business (and screw the little guy), he now wants to "relax" dozens of environmental rules:

• He wants to repeal rules requiring that manufacturers take back recyclable goods: "Every nickel deposit business doesn't hafta pay to some damn consumer is another nickel that can go to executive compensation, stockholder dividends, and my campaign."
• He wants to open 10 million acres of northern Maine to commercial development: "Every new business we can bring to Maine will generate executive compensation, stockholder dividends, and contributions to my campaign."
• He wants to reverse a ban on a chemical in children's products that has been linked to cancer: "Why worry about kids? They can't vote for me, nor can they increase executive compensation, stockholder dividends, or contributions to my campaign."
• He wants to make Maine's environmental laws conform to less-stringent Federal laws (eventually, he'd like them to conform to the environmental laws in Mississippi, Alabama, Nigeria, Sudan, and China): "Who needs clean air and clean water?"

Of course, the environmentalists are up in arms, but it's not like fat-ass LePage kept his big-business-fellating ideas secret, for God's sake.  Since Day One of his campaign, he has been talking about making Maine look like other business-friendly communities, like Camden, New Jersey; Gary, Indiana; Detroit, Michigan; and Bangalore, India.


Fat-ass Paul Lepage and Common Courtesy

One of the folks here in town asked me why I always refer to Fat-ass Paul LePage as "Fat-ass Paul LePage." 

"Why don't you show him the respect he is due as Governor of the State of Maine?"

Two reasons:

"Go to Hell" and "Kiss my butt." 

In the "kiss my butt" fiasco, he mentioned his "son" Devon Raymond.  Of course, as a rethuglican teabaggin lyin sack-o-turd, Fat-ass LePage is still not telling the truth.  Raymond was not adopted by the Fat-ass LePage family (hell, he probably isn't even in this country legally).  Raymond's daddy caddied for Fat-ass when Fat-ass was on vacation a few years back.

So I'll show Fat-ass LePage some common courtesy when he does the same for others.

I'm not holding my breath, though.

More on Fat-ass Paul LePage and his assault on common courtesy here.

Fat-Ass LePage Kisses Booty.

Fat-ass Paul LePage is at the MLK breakfast in Waterville today.

This is less than a week after he told the black community to "kiss my butt."

He initially said he wasn't going because he was going to a funeral.  Guess Fat-ass realized the funeral would be his political funeral.

Looks like he's the one who wound up kissing butt.

And the blacks should still ignore the LaKermesse-Cheese-Eating-Surrender-Monkey-Collaboration Festival.

Teabaggin' @ssholes... holding fast to their principles... until they're not.

"I Just Don't Care..."

Fat-ass Paul LePage on MPBN:

"Past governors have done what they've done and look at the shape we're in," he says. "I was elected governor to fix the problems and I'm not one that likes the fancy stuff, so take their tradtion and get somebody else to do it. I just don't care about that stuff. I'm there to do a job. I mean, they're just playing silly games I don't have time for."

Unspoken additional: yeah, do they expect me to give a rat's ass about anybody that isn't a teabagger?  I mean, I'm like, you hafta be white conservative rethuglican to mean anything to me, and you guys, like, you're black, for god's sake.

Yup, fat-ass, you're here to do a job.  Unfortunately, the job you think you were elected for -- gutting environmental regulations, eliminating taxes on the wealthy, providing sinecures for your fat-assed family, and just generally being a teabaggin butthole -- is not the job the people of Maine eleccted you for.  And even more unfortunately, the people of Maine aren't going to realize that until you've screwed them seventeen ways from Sunday.

Bringin' Class Back to Politics...

...one loud-mouthed @sshole at a time...

Maine's new governor, the fat-assed Paul LePage, has now pissed off the African-American portion of the population, by telling them to "kiss my butt" when he was asked why he declined to attend several MLK day events.  LePage probably also said -- or at least thought -- "I don't hafta go cuz I'm the governor, so neener neener neener, kiss my quivering, cottage-cheese, Limbaugh-like cellutlite."

Hae also said people should talk to Devon Richard, a black Jamaican "he brought into his home at age 17."  Guy's probably his fat-assed daughter's pokin pal.  Not that anyone would want to poke her lard-assed butt.  Wonder what Devon thinks about ol' Paul dissing the blacks twice in a row (telling Obama to "go to hell" and this little escapade)?

One small problem, though:

LePage often refers to 25-year-old Devon Raymond of Jamaica as his "adopted son." And although the governor and his wife are putting Raymond through college, and Raymond has attended LePage family gatherings with the LePage's other children on a regular basis since the age of 17, Raymond has not been formally adopted. He is also not a U.S. citizen.

[NOTE: MPBN -- Maine Public Broadcasting Network -- shows Devon's last name as Raymond, but most other media outlets say it's Richard.]

Given how much teabaggin rethuglicans hate ever'body who ain't 110% white, God-fearin', Bible-thumpin', hooker-humpin', sister-marryin', rifle-rack-in-the-pickmup Murrican, how can fat-ass LePage justify this? Oh, yeah, I forgot: IOKIYAR.

Since fat-ass LePage also issued -- already -- an executive order allowing (or perhaps requiring) state officials to ask about immigration status, it'll be interesting to see how he reacts when Devon gets jacked up by the Augusta cops for being a non-citizen taking advantage of the benefits of citizenship... like driving, working, breathing, and simply living..

Yeah, he's one class act.  But what do you expect from someone who worked for a bunch that makes Sanford and Sons look like Hammacher-Schlemmer?

Given the fact that LePage is a teabagging ultraconservative ugly-as-homemade-sin dickwad with more chins than a Chinese phonebook, it makes me wonder if he shares the conservative disdain for the French.  Does he hate himself as a "cheese-eating surrender monkey"?

And maybe the black community should tell fat-ass Lepage to kiss their collective butt at this year's La Kermesse Franco-American Cultural Heritage Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkey Collaboration Festival.