fat people, guns, and jesus

We should let stupid people make decisions

2011-01-06T11:17:00.003-06:00

It appears we already do:

New version of Huckleberry Finn - without the "n-word"

Roger Ebert, however, is the voice of reason:

Is 2011 the year?

2011-01-02T18:47:00.000-06:00

The year that we make the distinction between disabled and fat?

Probably not.

Five Rules For Life

2011-01-01T05:01:00.000-06:00

I often get "your blog is very negative", and "you only focus on the bad things in life".

I disagree, but in the spirit of positivity, I wanted to refer everyone to a site that is motivational, uplifting, and educational. Go visit "Five Rules For Life"...who knows, I may even submit my "Five Rules" one day!

This website represented in a picture

2010-12-30T10:02:00.000-06:00

I have had several people email me this work of art over the past few months. It seems to represent the craziness that we discuss here in one, simple picture.

If you know who created this, please let me know so I can give proper credit.

Note the simplistic brilliance:

Fast food
God reference (God bless AMERICA reference, because America...as you all know...is his chosen country)
Litter
A morbidly obese person on a scooter
Oil stains from a huge, gas-guzzling SUV (ok, I am assuming)

The only thing missing is cigarette butts, or the morbidly obese person smoking a cigarette himself! I'll let that slide though, because the artist put the central figure in a superhero costume which is thought-provoking.

Well done!

Jesus died so you can shop!

2010-12-25T06:27:00.000-06:00

I don't believe in god, jesus, or the story.

But, even with that said, I do know that "the reason for the season" is certainly lost on most of the followers.

Banksy nailed the hypocrisy:

Merry Christmas - go forth and spend money on meaningless, material possessions to celebrate your savior!

Selfishness and stupidity, rolled into a ball

2010-12-22T05:43:00.005-06:00

People never cease to amaze me. This story reinforces the stereotypes that we talk about on this blog. No doubt most of these people were fat, smoking a cigarette, and on their way to the closest McDonald's. With a Jesus fish on the back of their automobile.

_______________________

Opening of U.S. 69 ramp in Overland Park delayed months

Very bad news today for drivers who use U.S. 69 through Overland Park.

If you hoped the northbound ramp to 87th Street would open any time soon, forget it. You’re in for a lengthy wait.

State highway officials say they don’t expect it to open until this spring after several cars plowed through the construction zone and sunk in a concrete quagmire in the early evening hours of Dec. 3.

Workers were getting ready to open the ramp on Dec. 15. Now highway officials say it won’t reopen until spring 2011. The ramp has been closed since last August.

Engineers at the Kansas Department of Transportation have determined that a 1,200-foot section of the ramp on the Overland Park/Lenexa border was damaged when perhaps as many as 10 cars tried to cut through the work zone where concrete was poured.

KDOT said a car and an SUV had driven around the traffic barricades onto the newly poured ramp. The car got stuck at the top of the ramp and the SUV became stuck in the middle of the ramp. KDOT said the case has been referred to Overland Park prosecutors.

Construction crews poured 12 inches of concrete pavement for the ramp on Dec. 3and left the construction site at about 6:30 p.m. KDOT says the construction crews put traffic control devices in place signaling the ramp was closed.

The timing couldn’t be worse for getting the work completed since we’re moving into the heart of winter when weather can impede the work.

The 87th Street ramp is part of an $82 million project to widen U.S. 69 to three lanes in each direction from Interstate 35 to Interstate 435. The project is funded mostly with federal stimulus money.

Jesus Claus

2010-12-21T10:01:00.000-06:00

Fly!

2010-12-19T16:00:00.002-06:00

Why don’t I believe in God? No, no no, why do YOU believe in God? Surely the burden of proof is on the believer. You started all this. If I came up to you and said, "Why don’t you believe I can fly?" You’d say, "Why would I?" I’d reply, "Because it’s a matter of faith". If I then said, "Prove I can’t fly. Prove I can’t fly see, see, you can’t prove it can you?" You’d probably either walk away, call security or throw me out of the window and shout, "F—ing fly then you lunatic."

- Ricky Gervais

How do you feel about Xmas?

2010-12-14T12:54:00.003-06:00

I don't celebrate Christmas because it is the fictional birthday of a [most likely] fictional person who represents a fairy tale that modern day people embrace in all of their ignorance. I celebrate Christmas because it is the one time a year when most people make an attempt to be somewhat decent to each other*. I wish that were the case the other 364 days, but it isn't. So you take the little victories where you can get them.

*I also like "Christmas Vacation" with Chevy Chase.

Lennon on god

2010-12-08T15:58:00.004-06:00

"I believe in God, but not as one thing, not as an old man in the sky. I believe that what people call God is something in all of us. I believe that what Jesus and Mohammed and Buddha and all the rest said was right. It's just that the translations have gone wrong."

"Part of me suspects that I'm a loser, and the other part of me thinks I'm God Almighty."

"God is a concept by which we measure our pain."

"Jesus was all right, but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It's them twisting it that ruins it for me."

"Imagine there's no countries, it isn't hard to do. Nothing to kill or die for,
and no religion too. Imagine all the people, living life in peace."

R.I.P. John Lennon

You failed the common sense test

2010-12-05T08:20:00.003-06:00

As it turns cold, I am amazed to see people bundle up with hats, scarves, gloves, and heavy coats just so they can go outside and smoke. I am thankful they cannot smoke inside the office building - but, I still have to smell them when one gets on the elevator with me.

And, I am perplexed when I am at a stoplight and glance over to see someone with their car window cracked just enough to fit their hand through...the hand that is holding a cigarette. A few times a minute they bring their hand back in the car, take a puff, and then stick it back out the window again.

When I look at smokers, and the insane things they do to "enjoy" something that has no positive benefits and is highly likely to - one day - be responsible for their death, I come to the stark realization that they are stupid. I have no respect for them, I do not want to talk or interact with them, and I wish they could all be relegated to an island so I don't have to smell them in confined spaces, walk through their second-hand smoke, or look at their litter.

What you didn't learn in church on Sunday

2010-11-14T16:40:00.003-06:00

Today's lesson is from Leviticus. And it raises the question, if the bible is the divine word of god, don't you have to follow everything in it rather than pick and choose?

Leviticus 19:27 - "Do not cut the hair at the sides of your head or clip off the edges of your beard."

Did you shave today?

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Leviticus 19:16 - "Do not go about spreading slander among your people. Do not do anything that endangers your neighbor's life. I am the LORD."

Do you gossip? Do you talk smack? Do you talk badly about your co-workers or your boss?

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Leviticus 11:10 - "But all creatures in the seas or streams that do not have fins and scales--whether among all the swarming things or among all the other living creatures in the water--you are to detest."

Do you like shrimp? Lobster?

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Leviticus 11:7 - "And the pig, though it has a split hoof completely divided, does not chew the cud; it is unclean for you."

Do you eat BBQ? A tasty sausage link? Breakfast sausages with your eggs? Do you carry a leather purse? Wear leather shoes? Play catch with the football?

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Leviticus 19:19 - "Keep my decrees. Do not mate different kinds of animals. Do not plant your field with two kinds of seed. Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material."

Is that shirt a cotton-poly blend? Are you growing tomatoes and squash in the same field?

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Leviticus 15:19, 20 - "When a woman has her regular flow of blood, the impurity of her monthly period will last seven days, and anyone who touches her will be unclean till evening." AND "Anything she lies on during her period will be unclean, and anything she sits on will be unclean."

Women - always causing problems!

Join us next week for another installment of "what you didn't learn in church on Sunday".

Sneak peek:

Ephesians 5:4 - "Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving."

Did you use foul language today? You are fucked if you did.

(2 Kings 2:23-24 - god sends a couple of bears to rip up 42 little children for making fun of Elisha's bald head.)

Ironic, or just an idiot?

2010-11-13T08:08:00.003-06:00

I am trying to decide if this person is actually smart and making an attempt to be ironic, OR a complete idiot because the sticker preaching about speaking English uses "butt" instead of "but", and "your" instead of "you're".

Judging by the fact that they have a Wal-Mart ribbon and a "God Bless America" sticker, I have to vote idiot.

They're taking away our rights!

2010-11-06T08:07:00.018-05:00

San Francisco voted to ban restaurants from handing out toys with meals that fail to meet basic nutritional standards for fat, calories, and sodium (for example, McDonald's can't put a toy in an "unhealthy" happy meal). Last month, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg appealed to the U.S. Department of Agriculture requesting support for a new initiative that prohibits the use of food stamps for purchasing beverages with added sugar.

And people are going CRAZY in protest.

In case you haven't noticed, childhood obesity is a major problem today. According to the CDC, childhood obesity has more than tripled in the past 30 years with children aged 6 to 11 years increasing from 6.5% in 1980 to 19.6% in 2008, and adolescents aged 12 to 19 years increasing from 5.0% to 18.1%. If parents will not take responsibility to feed their children properly, then government should oversee and mandate the process. It is not "taking away rights", it is preventing child abuse. And from a bigger picture perspective, it will hopefully stem the societal burden we are forced to accept in order to care for these people who - most likely - will not be able to contribute as functioning members of society.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think withholding the toy from a happy meal will make a dent in the problem. But as a wise man once said, baby steps in the right direction are better than standing still.

As far as the outrage about mandating that government aid cannot be used to buy unhealthy crap - give me a break. If I am paying taxes to help you (which I gladly do, because I realize that people often try their best but still need help), then you damn sure need to use my money to sustain yourself in a healthy manner and not make yourself LESS likely to "get back on your feet" one day.

It is time to end all this politically correct nonsense. It is not "mean" to point out people that refuse to step up and take personal responsibility for themselves or the care of their children. If their actions did not ultimately affect us as a society, I would understand the argument. But their actions DO ultimately affect us as a society, whether in the form of increased taxes, increased healthcare costs, or simply taking the focus off of real disabilities that need our attention and are not the result of laziness, stupidity, and ignorance.

Sources:
Happy Meal Ban (POLL): Food Police or Protector?
New York attempts to ban use of food stamps for soda
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Childhood Obesity

Fearing for our future...

2010-11-03T13:57:00.005-05:00

I am stopped at a red light, and there is a rather large (I am being kind, she was morbidly obese) woman on the sidewalk parallel to my car. She is trying to pick something up off the ground, but cannot bend all the way down to get it.

What is on the ground?

She must have dropped the package before I glanced over. Skinny people are becoming a minority. It will cost us all - one way or another - in the long run.

Just in time for Halloween (well, actually, a day late)

2010-11-01T20:41:00.000-05:00

This is a handy guide for telling the difference between Jesus and Zombies.

Full text of Jon Stewart's speech at the "Rally to Restore Sanity"

2010-10-30T16:35:00.014-05:00

"You go then I'll go."

This is a speech everyone should listen to, watch, or read - I don't know that I agree 100%, because it is hard to compromise with "bat-shit crazy" people. But it is a good speech nonetheless.

"I can’t control what people think this was, I can only tell you my intentions. This was not a rally to ridicule people of faith or people of activism or to look down our noses at the heartland or passionate argument, or to suggest that times are not difficult and that we have nothing to fear. They are and we do. But we live now in hard times, not end times. And we can have animus and not be enemies.

But unfortunately one of our main tools in delineating the two broke. The country’s 24-hour political pundit perpetual panic conflictinator did not cause our problems, but it’s existence makes solving them that much harder. The press can hold it’s magnifying glass up to our problems, bringing them into focus, illuminating issues heretofore unseen - or they can use that magnifying glass to light ants on fire and then perhaps host a week of shows on the sudden, unexpected dangerous flaming ant epidemic.

If we amplify everything we hear nothing. There are terrorists and racists and Stalinists and Theocrats, but those are titles that must be earned. You must have the resume. Not being able to distinguish between real racists and Tea Partiers or real bigots and Juan Williams and Rick Sanchez is an insult, not only to those people but to the racists themselves who have put in the exhausting effort it takes to hate. Just as the inability to distinguish terrorists from Muslims makes us less safe not more. The press is our immune system. If we overreact to everything we actually get sicker...and perhaps eczema.

And yet with that being said I feel good — strangely, calmly good. Because the image of Americans that is reflected back to us by our political and media process is false. It is us through a fun house mirror, and not the good kind that makes you look slim in the waist and maybe taller - but the kind where you have a giant forehead and an ass shaped like a month-old pumpkin and one eyeball.

So, why would we work together? Why would you reach across the aisle to a pumpkin-assed, forehead eyeball monster? If the picture of us were true, of course our inability to solve problems would actually be quite sane and reasonable. Why would you work with Marxists actively subverting our Constitution, or racists and homophobes who see no one’s humanity but their own? We hear every damn day about how fragile our country is — on the brink of catastrophe, torn by polarizing hate. And how it’s a shame that we can’t work together to get things done. But the truth is we do. We work together to get things done every damn day!

The only place we don’t is here (Washington D.C.) or on cable TV. But Americans don’t live here or on cable TV. Where we live our values and principles form the foundation that sustains us while we get things done, not the barriers that prevent us from getting things done. Most Americans don’t live their lives solely as Democrats, Republicans, Liberals or Conservatives. Americans live their lives more as people that are just a little bit late for something they have to do — often something that they do not want to do, but they do it. Impossible things every day that are only made possible by the little reasonable compromises that we all make.

Look on the screen - this is where we are, this is who we are (points to the Jumbotron screen which show traffic merging into a tunnel). These cars — that’s a schoolteacher who probably thinks his taxes are too high. He’s going to work. There’s another car - a woman with two small kids who can’t really think about anything else right now. There’s another car swinging I don’t even know if you can see it — the lady’s in the NRA. She loves Oprah. There’s another car — an investment banker, gay, also likes Oprah. Another car is a Latino carpenter. Another car a fundamentalist vacuum salesman. Atheist obstetrician. Mormon Jay-Z fan. But this is us. Every one of the cars that you see is filled with individuals of strong belief and principles they hold dear — often principles and beliefs in direct opposition to their fellow travelers.

And yet these millions of cars must somehow find a way to squeeze one by one into a mile long 30 foot wide tunnel carved underneath a might river. Carved, by the way, by people who I’m sure had their differences. And they do it. Concession by concession. You go. Then I’ll go. You go then I’ll go. You go then I’ll go. Oh my God, is that an NRA sticker on your car? Is that an Obama sticker on your car? Well, that’s okay — you go and then I’ll go.

And sure, at some point there will be a selfish jerk who zips up the shoulder and cuts in at the last minute, but that individual is rare and he is scorned and not hired as an analyst.

Because we know instinctively as a people that if we are to get through the darkness and back into the light we have to work together and the truth is, there will always be darkness. And sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel isn’t the promised land. Sometimes it’s just New Jersey.

But we do it anyway, together.

If you want to know why I’m here and want I want from you I can only assure you this: you have already given it to me. You’re presence was what I wanted.

Sanity will always be and has always been in the eye of the beholder. To see you here today and the kind of people that you are has restored mine.

Thank you."

Christians don't judge, and are tolerant and loving.

2010-10-27T14:22:00.008-05:00

Clint McCance is from Arkansas, so you might excuse his ignorance as a product of inbreeding. But he is also a member of the Midland School Board which makes his "alleged" homophobic, hate-filled rant on Facebook all the more disturbing.

Here is what someone who helps oversee the education of our youth posts:

"Seriously they want me to wear purple because five queers committed suicide. The only way im wearin it for them is if they all commit suicide. I cant believe the people of this world have gotten this stupid. We are honoring the fact that they sinned and killed therselves because of their sin. REALLY PEOPLE."

Regarding his own children:

"I would disown my kids if they were gay. They will not be welcome at my home or in my vicinity. I will absolutely run them off. Of course my kids know better. My kids will have solid christian beliefs. See it infects everyone."

And, this gem:

"No because being a fag doesn't give you the right o ruin the rest of our lives. It you get easily offended by being caleld a fag then don't tell anyone you are a fag. Keep that shit to yourself. I don't care how people decide to live their lives. They don't bother me if they keep it thereselves. It pisses me off though that we make special purple fag day for them. I like that fags can't procreate. I also enjoy the fact that they often give each other AIDS and die. If you aren't against it, you might as well be for it."

Thanks for continuing the stereotypes about religious whack-jobs, Arkansas residents, closeted gay men...

Do you really need 64 ounces of anything?

2010-10-26T15:09:00.000-05:00

Especially when you are - how can I say this delicately - somewhat overweight?

Moderation - it's not just a word in the dictionary.

If that is the case, do we still need doctors?

2010-10-24T13:49:00.002-05:00

And is there a cost associated with the healing? Is it covered by my health plan? Does this make all the debates over universal healthcare obsolete? Does this mean I can eat and smoke and drink until I am on the verge of death, and then go get healed and start all over again?

So many questions.

You got your god in my politics!

2010-10-22T09:32:00.000-05:00

If you aren't worried about the Tea Party and Republicans pushing religion into politics and public policy, you should be. We already have enough people in public office who think god is talking to them and guiding their decisions (even our former President*), we certainly don't need more.

If you aren't afraid, you aren't paying attention.

"God is the reason that I’m running. If I didn’t believe that there were a cause greater than myself worth fighting for, if I didn’t believe that it takes a complete dying of self to make things right in this election cycle I would not be running and when you die to yourself you rely on a power greater than yourself so prayer is what’s gotten us all through."

- Christine O’Donnell, Tea Party candidate**

*President Bush's response to Bob Woodward's question on whether he consulted his father (former President Bush) on invading Iraq was that he is "the wrong father to appeal to for advice ... there is a higher father that I appeal to". Also, Former Palestinian foreign minister Nabil Shaath says Mr Bush told him and Mahmoud Abbas, former prime minister and now Palestinian President: "I'm driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, 'George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.' And I did, and then God would tell me, 'George go and end the tyranny in Iraq,' and I did."

**Two more bonus quotes from Christine O'Donnell:
"I am not a witch. I'm you."
"Where in the Constitution is the separation of church and state?"

Child abuse

2010-10-20T05:56:00.000-05:00

This photo has been floating around the Internet for a while (I am not sure who to give credit to). It is difficult to decide what to talk about first:

1.) The child in morbidly obese.
2.) The child is too old to be in a stroller - it is robbed of whatever chance it has to burn off a few calories. Then again, it could very well be in the stroller because it cannot muster the energy to walk very far (due, of course, to the substantial weight problem).
3.) The morbidly obese child, in the stroller, is eating ice cream.
4.) The mother is also morbidly obese.

This isn't funny, it is sad. And I can't think of one single reason this child should not be taken from its parents and the parents put in jail for child abuse.

Hi, I'm a Tea-Partier

2010-10-19T04:55:00.000-05:00

This is the most comprehensive dissection of the Tea Party "talking points" I have seen to date. It will make you laugh, it will make you cry (cry because of the stupidity).

Share it with your friends - maybe it will open a few eyes.

And don't worry, I will get back to posting photos of fat-people after the elections next week.

People are pigs. And lazy.

2010-10-16T08:59:00.000-05:00

You are going into Target, and there are at least four trash cans in front of the store. What do you do? You put your garbage on the ground outside the car door*.

Why should you be responsible for your mess? The Target employees get paid good money to clean it up.

* I couldn't get the Sonic bag in the photo - it had already blown out of the frame.

No, I just fear his followers.

2010-10-15T10:14:00.000-05:00

But seriously, drive fear into your followers as early and often as possible. It is what keeps them giving money and coming back, week after week.