Gryffyd Eamonn Dempsey » Politics

In which I destroy my political viability within the system

Gryffyd — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 19:05:52 +0000

It is past time to repeal this nation’s counter-productive and repressive drug laws. The erosion of civil liberties that have accompanied the last twenty years of drug policing should be reason enough, but the added benefit of taxing a legal product should add impetus for change.

The main danger with such a shift in policy is that po-faced assholes must then find some other project by which they can regulate our lives.

Stop it. Just stop.

Gryffyd — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 21:18:27 +0000

You would think that we could have maybe a day or two respite from politicking, but no. Earlier today, as I was walking to Border’s to buy the audio mash note from my gal-pal Lucinda Williams, I passed a street corner exhibit denouncing the Wall Street bailout. I had just glimpsed the name “LaRouche” on the placard when the young man at the exhibit offered me a leaflet and asked, “Have you heard about the coming crash?” I made sure he saw me roll my eyes but did not stop.

Raising the bar

Gryffyd — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 18:01:02 +0000

Congratulations to President-elect Obama. While his is an inspiring achievement for many, let us not forgot that for others his example is less salutary. I am not speaking here of his political rivals. Instead I think we should pity first-generation children of immigrants, to whom he now represents an almost insurmountable set of expectations.

Also, Obama has a particular example to set for the nation. He would do well to pick a shelter dog when fulfilling his promise to his daughters.

A wild guess

Gryffyd — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 22:12:12 +0000

Because I get irritated by all the anti-mark-to-market bloviating going on, here is an apposite observation by Pierce Scranton, Chief of Staff to the President’s Council of Economic Advisors (feel free to discount any and all of his opinions if you: (a) hate advisors, (b) hate chiefs of staff, (c) hate the gubmint, (d) hate the President, (e) hate economics):

But our fear is that by suspending mark-to-market, you are masking the problem. What matters for financial institutions right now is their liquidity positions. If they are unable to make good on something that requires near term liquidity, and they are relying on something they can’t sell in the market as collateral, that just masks their problem. Mark-to-market granted has some merits. So does the SEC saying we’re going to give you some time. The bill provides for a study and report on mark-to-market. If suspending mark-to-market would be effective, that authority is included in the legislation. The last thing we want to do when there is a lack of confidence in financial institutions is to prove an accounting mechanism for them to say “We’re just fine.” The market is going to see right through that, which would breed more distrust. [my emphasis]

I think over the next ten years, the revenue the government will make on the “bail-out” will have a significant effect on reducing the deficit and national debt. It’ll be an indirect taxation of foolish institutional financial gambles, and the citizen who will therefore avoid (partially) the massive tax increase that must come some day, due to our massive national debt, will be thankful.

Oh fer two

Gryffyd — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 20:37:33 +0000

Chevy Chase is hoping some fellow comedian will decimate Sarah Palin, who has apparently insulted his sense of proper gender roles:

“I want her to decimate this woman. This woman is, I can’t believe there hasn’t been more about it. … It’s just unbelievable to me this woman is actually running for vice president,” he continued.

Any fool is entitled to their political opinion, but let us recall that this is the same fool who said of Bill Murray’s brilliant turn in Lost in Translation that “I thought Billy’s acting was restrained. I thought it was too controlled.” What a witless aperçu.

Sometimes a great notion

Gryffyd — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 20:42:21 +0000

The vice-presidential candidate of one party is six years older than I, and the presidential candidate of the other party only nine years older. Either I am getting old or our political system is overwhelmed by the fresh groovy waves of youth. Obviously the only thing to do is to declare my own intention to run for the supreme office of the land. My platform will be built on cedar planks of crank Constitutionalism, advocacy of a new Platinum Standard, the abolishment of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the banning of Big Pants on kids, legalization of all drugs except pot, the perversion of community norms and the normalization of relations with Canada.

But no, it is not to be. I have already promised to write in Mrs The Fyd’s name on my ballot. And never let it be said that my vote is lightly promised or foolishly cast.

Choosy Interviewee

Gryffyd — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 15:58:04 +0000

Last night I dreamed that I was being interviewed by Clarence Page, man-on-the-street style, about Barack Obama. My only reply that I recall was that I thought Obama would like me more than McCain would. Also that a white reporter wanted to interview me but I had no time for him because he worked for USA Today.

Dumb and dumber

Gryffyd — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 18:38:51 +0000

Jim Corr is self-evidently a cretin and I should not assist in propagating any cretinous musician’s political views. However, a certain common element to his ravings struck me as worthy of comment. This is the use by these cretins of jargon to give their idiocies a patina of authority. In Corr’s case he refers to a “false flag operation” like he’s some expert in spycraft and disinformation. He’s not; he’s a thick musician who’s been impressed when he’s seen the phrase on whatever lunatic troofer websites he frequents and thinks his using it in turn will impress his audience.

Rosie O’Donnell blathered on about a collapsed building having “defied physics”. The only way a collapsing building defies physics is if it actually falls upward. O’Donnell thinks that she has some inside secret to engineering objections to the collapse of Building 7, but actually she’s just an idiot who’s mindlessly parrotting something she read on a website and that impressed her febrile walnut of a brain.

Tom Cruise said once that he had “studied the history of psychiatry”. No; more likely Cruise once read a wee pamphlet prepared by one of his fellow loony cultists. Said pamphlet was prepared by dredging Dianetics for LRH’s loony views on psychiatry, then boiling those views into a short form that could be understood by the stupider celebrity Scientologists. His “study” of psychiatry was the equivalent of a child studying the back of a breakfast cereal box.

Honi soit qui mal y pense

Gryffyd — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:52:28 +0000

When Gorgeous George Galloway appeared before the Senate way back when, even some of those who thought he was lying through his oil-smeared pie-hole could admire his artful use of parliamentary rhetoric. In a similar vein, I present an official defending his government’s policy with an élan that Condoleeza Rice was unable to summon when confronted by the witless Barbara Boxer. Here’s French Prime Minister François Fillon:

“Avant d’être tournée contre mon gouvernement, cette motion de censure est tournée contre ceux qui décidèrent avec courage et lucidité d’engager la France dans un processus certes difficile, mais juste”, a-t-il souligné, alors que la décision d’intervenir en Afghanistan avait été prise en 2001 par Jacques Chirac et son Premier ministre socialiste Lionel Jospin. [...] Le retrait, ce serait la défaite. (…) En somme, nous laisserions à nos alliés le soin de régler l’affaire, laissant ainsi entendre que leur victoire ou celle d’al-Qaïda et des Talibans ne nous empêcherait pas de dormir”, a-t-il dit. [...] L’opposition nous accuse d”atlantisme’, façon aimable de nous présenter à la solde de George Bush. Chacun l’aura compris, il s’agit pour eux de surfer sur l’un de nos travers les plus discutables : l’anti-américanisme primaire”, a-t-il dit.

Perhaps it all reads better in French but would sound quotidian in English. More likely it represents a real advantage that comes from having Cabinet-equivalent officials who have to survive equally in the rowdy world of parliamentary politics as well as their bureaucracies. That class of our officialdom might be dominated by too many academics and lawyers to allow for such facility with extemporaneousness.

Speaking of officialdom, Barack Obama has confirmed that I have as much or more foreign policy experience as does he. I always knew I was presidential caliber:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/10/us/politics/10obama.html?ref=us

I like this quote from McCain’s spokesthing:

“Oh, and as Senator Obama may know, [McCain] has actually spent some time living abroad as well.”

Dude

Gryffyd — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 18:36:54 +0000

If you emerge from the bushes in the landscaping around the Walgreen’s parking lot, and I am walking by with the dogs, and if you’ve just been in those bushes for the purpose of getting high by whatever means, then please don’t try and engage me in incoherent, drug-logic small-talk. I really don’t care what you’re doing in the bushes and I don’t feel like chatting with you about my cool-looking dogs and am I a professional dog walker and whatever nonsense is firing from your fried synapses. I just don’t want you to get any closer to me in case I get twitchy and have to hit you, which will probably get the dogs all crazy and I’ll get gross bodily fluids on my hands.

In other Montavilla drugs news, I saw my first R0n Rhymes-with-Pall lawn sign the other evening.