Shakesville

World's Greatest Dad, Part II

You might remember supergenius Mark Ciptak from the post Deeks wrote two weeks ago, introducing him as the upstanding citizen who named his newborn daughter Sarah McCain Palin without consulting his wife.

Last night, Steven Colbert named Mr. Ciptak his "Alpha Dog of the Week," to hilarious result. The clip is worth watching just for Colbert's reaction after it cuts back from the video of Ciptak explaining his classy move.

[Transcript below.]

Colbert: They say, folks, if you lay down with dogs, you wake up with fleas. You lay down with my kinda dog, you wake up with puppies. This is my Alpha Dog of the Week! [sound of dog barking]

Tonight's Alpha Dog: Mark Ciptak. [sound of dog barking] While most of us wear our support for a candidate on our bumpers, our hats, or our artfully manscaped chests, only Tennessee resident Mark Ciptak had the alpha dog instincts to wear his on his newborn baby daughter—who he legally named Sarah McCain Palin Ciptak, in an effort to "get the word out" for the McCain campaign. This man, right here, will do whatever it takes to raise awareness for his favorite causes. Just ask his two other kids, Meals-on-Wheels Ciptak and Please Spay or Neuter Your Pets Ciptak.

But, folks, simply naming your child Sarah McCain Palin isn't enough to make you an alpha dog. No! Mark clinched the title by doing it behind his wife's back, after the couple had agreed on the name Ava Grace. Yeah. Ava Grace—that name wouldn't have helped anyone. Except his daughter's chances of leading a well-adjusted life.

Now, here, Ciptak takes us back to the moment he made his alpha move.

Ciptak: 'Bout a half an hour before to leave the hospital, I brought up to my wife—'cause my conscience was really, you know, drilling me; I just really felt bad that she wasn't involved—and I really thought she was going to be, like, gung ho—"Yes, let's do it." She wasn't.

Colbert: [shrugs like "Who'da thunk it?!"; snickers] The good news is: They can save time by filing the name change and divorce papers on the same day!

Oh, oh, by the way, side note: Ciptak also named the placenta "Lieberman."

If you ask me, Sarah McCain Palin could not be a better name for a baby. After all, bald, wrinkly babies bear a striking resemblance to John McCain; not to mention, they nap almost as much.

So, Mark Ciptak, for putting country first, wayyyyy ahead of ever having sex with your wife again, you are my Alpha Dog of the Week! [sound of dog barking] We'll be right back!

Important Announcement

If I see this commercial one. more. fooking. time…

…there is going to be trouble. Serious trouble. Most likely of the sort where I yell impotently at the television set, "I hate this bloody advert!" and possibly throw a slipper at it.

Daily Kitteh

I'm fairly certain I get more pictures of Tilsy with her tongue hanging out or her mouth hanging open than I do not.

Teh Cuteness, It Burns

Mini Terrorist Fist Bumpage!
Is it just me, or are there way more pictures of excited kids meeting nominees (at least one of them, ahem) this election? I love these pictures, not only because they remind me why I care about teaspoons, but also because they make me really nostalgic—I remember being a little kid who was wide-eyed with wonder at the concept of democracy, who would have loved to meet a presidential candidate, who thought memorizing the list of presidents was the greatest class assignment evah, even though my classmates were complaining about it, because it seemed to me that any patriot worth her salt would know that sort of thing.

[Pic seen at Cif America.]

Needed: One Consignment of Sunlight

by Shaker Sunnyhello

The Kansas City Star, in its legal battle to see all records of police complaints from the last three years, has pried loose 50 randomly selected complaint files from the Kansas City police department.

As the files document, all but a small fraction of complaints were dismissed because of insufficient evidence—that is, the citizen's word against the officer's. But the citizens' words reveal a dizzying kaleidoscope of mistrust, anger, fear, and memories of harassment and racism. What's more, the Star's analysis points to the abysmal futility of lodging complaints against KC police officers.

There's so much local teaspoon work to do here that it's hard to know where to start. But perhaps we start small, by correcting the zanily oblivious notions of the Office of Community Complaints.

[Trigger warning on the stories in the following link.]

For instance, consider the story of Gloria Ellington, who relates that an officer first handcuffed her, then felt her up during a routine traffic stop, then threatened her with jail for "asking too many questions."

Her file concludes that there was no evidence to support Ellington, so the Office suggested she take her complaints about the tickets to Municipal Court. Because surely that's what would be upsetting her: the traffic ticket.

Or perhaps we start by asking the Office to explain why exactly it is, again, that officers need to be extra-super-careful about not being jackasses to African-American males:

"I became very upset, realizing that the only reason I could see for being detained is that I am a black male," the man wrote in his complaint.

An officer later told him that he was in a "zero tolerance" area that allowed officers to stop anyone for any reason. There had been a rash of burglaries and one suspect was a black man. The officer said the man became belligerent and loud during the stop. One officer admitted telling the citizen "to be a man."

The Office of Community Complaints did not uphold the complaint, saying there was "insufficient evidence" to make a ruling. But it added a cautionary note that it would be best not to tell African-American males "to be a man."

Where do I start? I'll praise transparency and those fighting for it. When a complaint is warranted, by God, I have to file it. If I witness something warranting a complaint, I have to step up and offer to file a record of what I saw and heard. And I'll add my voice to those calling for release of the full complaints archive.

I understand that the PD doesn't want to deal with inflamed racial tensions or mistrust between police and public at the release of these files. And yes, the files will raise subtle and complex questions as well as boiling rage. I don't care. We ought to be allowed to deal with it; I'd rather we were temporarily crushed by the truth than permanently sedated by the lie.

Joyblub

Amanda Jones, 109, the daughter of a man born into slavery, has lived a life long enough to touch three centuries. And after voting consistently as a Democrat for 70 years, she has voted early for the country's first black presidential nominee.

…Amanda Jones' father urged her to exercise her right to vote, despite discriminatory practices at the polls and poll taxes meant to keep black and poor people from voting. Those practices were outlawed for federal elections with the 24th Amendment in 1964, but not for state and local races in Texas until 1966.

Amanda Jones says she cast her first presidential vote for Franklin Roosevelt, but she doesn't recall which of his four terms that was. When she did vote, she paid a poll tax, her daughters said. That she is able, for the first time, to vote for a black presidential nominee for free fills her with joy, Jones said. (Link)

[H/T to Shaker ajollypyruvate.]

Democracy Is Coming...

...To The USA.

Leonard Cohen

It's a Motherfuckin' Walk-Off!

This happened minutes from my home—and I really can't even properly describe how blub-inducingly awesome I think it is. We are the blue corner of Indiana, but still:

Some three dozen workers at a telemarketing call center in Indiana walked off the job rather than read an incendiary McCain campaign script attacking Barack Obama, according to two workers at the center and one of their parents.

Nina Williams, a stay-at-home mom in Lake County, Indiana, tells us that her daughter recently called her from her job at the center, upset that she had been asked to read a script attacking Obama for being "dangerously weak on crime," "coddling criminals," and for voting against "protecting children from danger."

Williams' daughter told her that up to 40 of her co-workers had refused to read the script, and had left the call center after supervisors told them that they would have to either read the call or leave, Williams says. The call center is called Americall, and it's located in Hobart, IN.

"They walked out," Williams says of her daughter and her co-workers, adding that they weren't fired but willingly sacrificed pay rather than read the lines. "They were told [by supervisors], `If you all leave, you're not gonna get paid for the rest of the day."

The daughter, who wanted her name withheld fearing retribution from her employer, confirmed the story to us. "It was like at least 40 people," the daughter said. "People thought the script was nasty and they didn't wanna read it."

A second worker at the call center confirmed the episode, saying that "at least 30" workers had walked out after refusing to read the script.

"We were asked to read something saying [Obama and Democrats] were against protecting children from danger," this worker said. "I wouldn't do it. A lot of people left. They thought it was disgusting."

The people who walked out need those jobs. Many of them will have been black and Latin@. Most of them will have been working poor. All of them mean nothing more to John McCain and Sarah Palin than whatever mileage they could have gotten out of a folksy anecdote about "Joan the Telemarketer." And every last one of them has more integrity than the presidential and vice-presidential nominees of the Republican Party. Combined.

[H/T to Shaker Amish451, who got it from The Littlest Gator at Group News Blog.]

Spoiled Little Prince

by Shaker Sunless Nick

Via Marcella Chester, I came across name of Aaron P. Taylor, who seems bent on achieving the platonic ideal of rape-apologism. (Trigger Warning: In fact, because even the title of the piece—even the URL—merits a trigger warning, I will not link directly, but you can find the original post via Marcella).

The post is called: "Advice 4 Women: How to NOT Get a 'Deserved' Raping," and it's the story of Aaron's experience in a club, in which a woman danced suggestively with him and then refused his attempts to kiss her, leaving him sexually frustrated and full of advice for women about how to avoid getting raped—because not all guys are "nice" like he is.

Naturally, he engages in the initial disclaimer about how women don't deserve to be raped BUT… Then, just as predictably, he follows it with a couple of dozen paragraphs explaining how they totally do—he can't quite decide whether this is because they don't understand men properly, or because they are lying teases.

On the one hand:

Now, for you girls out there that may not be aware, when you dance with a guy over and over again, and get more and more suggestive in your intentions via dancing, a few things happen in the male psyche:

1. His brain sends blood from his head to his "little head" and gives him a boner

2. He starts to think: "I know we're just dancing…but DANG, she must REALLY want me to give it to her right!"

As far as 1 is concerned, erections are pretty autonomic—but I've never found that they remove my abilities to think, or to moderate my actions, or to exercise my conscience. As far as 2 is concerned, I've also not found them to remove my capacity to ask things instead of just assuming them.

Which brings me to the other hand:

What about the fact that this girl, who didn't have any REAL interest in me, simply teased me to rile me up in the hopes of boosting her own ego? What about the fact that this girl grinded her ass on my penis not once, twice, or three times, but several, SEVERAL times??

So Aaron assumed that a [woman] who was interested in a hot dance must have seen it as a precursor to sex, just as he did. And when that assumption fell short, it made her a liar and tease. His assumptions defined the truth, and he defined her by whether she fell in line with them. Later, he brings his two themes two together:

Understand something, ladies: men are creatures that are very easily stimulated via visually-pleasing images and certain touches. We get off on seeing erotic images – it's the reason girlie magazines and adult movies exist in the first place. We also get off anytime any girl even goes so far as to brush up against our private parts, especially in the frontal region.

So, when a girl comes along who is actively (read: not from a distance, not while sitting somewhere by herself, unaware that guy is looking at her, but actively) performing certain actions or saying certain things that signal sexual interest…

WHAT ELSE IS A GUY SUPPOSED TO THINK, other than: "This girl want to give me sex!"

Bringing us back to the old idea that we men have no self control; that our responses must be managed by [women] lest we run away with ourselves. Yet somehow, this mindless inability to control ourselves doesn't translate into it being a good idea to ask a [woman] what she's after—instead, in we should be left to jump to our own conclusions, and any [woman] who dares not to match them is a lying tease.

But [women]! He's still afraid you might not get it, so he resorts to one more argument:

Hmm… I see some of you ladies may still not get it. How about this: doing these sorts of things to a guy is akin to finding out about a sale at your favorite shopping store. If the place advertised all week long that they'd be having a midnight sale where everything in the store was going to be 50% off, and all during the week they assured you of getting such a great deal

…wouldn't you be a bit pissed off if, upon the day of the "advertised" sale, you discovered that instead of lowering the prices by half, they actually INCREASED the costs of their goods by double or triple?

It would almost make you want to say "screw this" and rob the store to get your promised discount, wouldn't it? Hmm, sounds like the thoughts of someone wanting to "take" what they were having teased in front of them…

As if [women's] bodies are comparable to a shop's wares—whether in the sense of being things, or of being available for him to own. As if a [woman] being interested in a dance was a promise of sex that she was then breaking—as if, once again, his mistaken assumptions make her a liar.

Aaron doesn't spend any time on what men can do to about this. Which is odd, seeing as how men have a very simple way of navigating this labyrinth: Ask; it's amazing how quickly the "mixed" or "misleading" signals will be cleared up. But Aaron's type doesn't like to ask. They want to live in a world where their impulses and passing thoughts are gospel truths, because any woman that doesn't match them is a liar, a slut, or a tease—where they need take no responsibility for their actions, because anything can be blamed on the women who failed to manage them properly.

A woman who acted this way would be dismissed as a spoiled little princess. So I guess that makes Aaron a spoiled little prince. Whom I cordially invite to get the fuck out of my gender. And species.

Two-Minute Nostalgia Sublime

Easy Reader, from The Electric Company

This is when my lifelong crush on Morgan Freeman began—watching The Electric Company when I was about three years old and thinking Easy Reader was the hottest shit evah!

Question of the Day

Today's question deals with sniglets. What's a sniglet? Well, take a gander:

A sniglet is a neologism defined as "any word that doesn't appear in the dictionary, but should". The term was coined by writer/actor/comedian Rich Hall, who first created a series of Sniglets while he was a performer on the 1980s HBO comedy series Not Necessarily the News. Each episode of the monthly series featured a regular segment on Sniglets by Hall. Hall's own sniglets along with submissions by fans were compiled into several books, starting with Sniglets and More Sniglets.

I distinctly remember a friend of mine years ago coming up with a sniglet that I'm fairly certain made it onto the show:

Auldlanxiety - The fear of making a complete ass of yourself during new year's eve.

What cool sniglets have you, or someone you know, come up with?

Quote of the Day

"Obama—of course!"—An anonymous, paid-by-the-hour John McCain "team leader," when asked for whom she's going to vote in the upcoming election.

Sophs is Sleepy

I just really felt like we needed more kitteh today, so I took this short vid of Sophie while she slept on my chest, using my hand as her pillow. Turn up the volume and you'll hear her purring like a wee lawnmower.

(Sorry it's so dark; the video component on my digital camera isn't that great.)

There Are Bad Times Just Around the Corner

And we've the gun sales to prove it.

Faced with a bleak economic forecast, and the possibility of a Democrat in the White House, Americans everywhere have been stocking up. On weapons. Yes, weapons. Not soup, or blankets, or water. Not even bibles. But guns and ammunition.

As Bob Leyshion, American citizen, puts it: "People are preparing for catastrophe right now. It's insurance. With the stock market crash and people out of work, and the illegal aliens in this area, the probability of civil disorder is very high."

So, with this perfect storm of a faltering stock market, illegal aliens, and presumed Democratic control of the government, we are, apparently, on the verge chaos, rioting, and the breakdown of civil society. Better stock up on semi-automatic weapons then.

"Look at the political situation and the financial situation. It's common sense. People are scared," says Gun Emporium owner Fred Russell. It's that common sense that says put an Uzi in your kid's hands, I guess.

And as gun owner Margaret Marcus explains: "I think right now people are scared Obama is going to take their rights away." Don't worry, Margaret Marcus, I am pretty sure your membership in a well regulated militia will not be infringed.

Speaking of militias, and people with guns and the breakdown of civil society:

Law enforcement agents have broken up a plot by two neo-Nazi skinheads to assassinate Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and shoot or decapitate 88 black people, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives said Monday.

Jim Cavanaugh, special agent in charge of ATF's Nashville field office, said the two men planned to kill 88 black people, including 14 by beheading. The numbers 88 and 14 are symbolic in the white supremacist community.

I don't have any jokes to accompany that bit of information.

In Which Yet Another Dood Who Thinks He's Hilarious is Really Just an Asshole

[Trigger warning re: hanging and violence.]

So this total fuckneck in West Hollywood puts up as a Halloween decoration a mannequin dressed like Governor Sarah Palin hanging from a noose and argues that it's "art" and justifiable because it's a holiday decoration:

Chad Michael Morisette, who lives in the house, told CBS 2 News that drivers and bus passengers have been stopping to snap pictures of the macabre scene.

Morisette says the effigy would be out of bounds at any other time of year, but it's within the spirit of Halloween.

He says "it should be seen as art, and as within the month of October. It's Halloween, it's time to be scary, it's time to be spooky."

That? Isn't "spooky." That's heinous. And since Mr. Morisette is evidently woefully unaware of the history of hanging uppity women (i.e. "witches"), I hope someone will put a copy of The Crucible in his trick-or-treat bag this year.

And, say, here's another reason why hanging effigies aren't really funny: Because real people are still hung or dragged to their deaths at the end of ropes in this country.

Just sayin'.

[H/Ts to Shakers mr_subjunctive by email and pfunkem in comments.]

Thanks for the Memories; I'll Keep Them in My TUBES!!!

Oh, Ted Stevens—it's so ironic that you've been convicted of failing to report gifts, when you've given us so many gifts that will keep giving long after you're gone. DANCE!

I just the other day got, an internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday and I just got it yesterday. Why? Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the internet commercially...

They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the internet. And again, the internet is not something you just dump something on. It's not a truck.

It's a series of tubes.

And if you don't understand those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and its going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material. (Link)

Wheeeeeeeeeee!

Palin's a Brilliant Feminist, I Swear!

by Shaker JMonkey, a dad and a feminist who lives with his partner in Oregon.

Maybe you've heard of Elaine Lafferty. She was editor-in-chief at Ms. Magazine, considers herself a Democrat and a feminist activist.

These days, she's advising the McCain campaign and writing for Sarah Palin and, today, posted an article at Tina Brown's "The Daily Beast" that explains how Palin is "very smart" and that Palin "supports women's rights, deeply and passionately."

No, really. Go take a gander.

Just in case you may be wondering what, exactly, Lafferty is doing for Palin, it appears she's been writing a big speech on women's rights for her. But first, she's got to reassure us that Palin is smart, despite all the nay-sayers' nay-saying.

Now by "smart," I don't refer to a person who is wily or calculating or nimble in the way of certain talented athletes who we admire but suspect don't really have serious brains in their skulls. I mean, instead, a mind that is thoughtful, curious, with a discernable pattern of associative thinking and insight. Palin asks questions, and probes linkages and logic that bring to mind a quirky law professor I once had. Palin is more than a "quick study"; I'd heard rumors around the campaign of her photographic memory and, frankly, I watched it in action. She sees. She processes. She questions, and only then, she acts. What is often called her "confidence" is actually a rarity in national politics: I saw a woman who knows exactly who she is.

Really? A photographic memory? A quick study? Either Lafferty and I are not listening to the same person, or none of those qualities have emerged in interviews or debates quite the way they have one-on-one, making misgivings about these reported smarts totally understandable. I feel the same way about Palin that I do about Bush: Both are smart, but they lack any shred of curiosity about the world outside of their own tiny circle.

But back to that speech…

So no simple task then, this speech on women's rights.

Er, yeah. No shit.

For the sin of being a Christian personally opposed to abortion, Palin is being pilloried by the inside-the-Beltway Democrat feminist establishment. (Yes, she is anti-abortion. And yes, instead of buying organic New Zealand lamb at Whole Foods, she joins other Alaskans in hunting for food. That's it. She is not a right-wing nut, and all the rest of the Internet drivel—the book banning at the Library, the rape kits decision—is nonsense. I digress.)

That's true. Every feminist I know is insistent on buying only organic New Zealand lamb. And, clearly, these two issues—reproductive choice and organic New Zealand lamb—are of equivalent importance. In other words, both are concerns only of effete, elite, out-of-touch, liberal metropolitan types.

And check out the way in which she completely debunks the stories that she fired the town librarian because she indicated she would not ban books and that the town under her leadership billed rape victims for the rape kits used to gather evidence? So deft, it's worth requoting.

It is nonsense.

Brilliant.

Look, I am obviously personally pro-choice, and I disagree with McCain and Palin on that and a few other issues. But like many other Democrats, including Lynn Rothschild, I'm tired of the Democratic Party taking women for granted. I also happen to believe Sarah Palin supports women's rights, deeply and passionately.

True. So long as you ignore Palin's anti-choice position, her apparent belief that abortion clinic bombers aren't terrorists, the (totally NOT debunked) rape kit story, and McCain's own statement that Palin is "a direct counterpoint to the liberal feminist agenda for America," she's clearly a passionate feminist.

Many of those—not all—who decried the sexist media treatment of Hillary Clinton have been silent as Palin has been skewered in the old ways that female public figures are skewered, as well as a host of sexualized new ways as well.

But here is the good news: women, citizens of America's high and low culture, the Economist and People magazine readers, will get it. They got it with Hillary even when feminist leaders were not supporting her or doing so half-heartedly. Yes, Palin is a harder sell, she looks and sounds different, and one can rightfully oppose her based on abortion policies. If you only vote on how a person personally feels about abortion, you will never want her to darken your door. If you care about anything else, she will continue to intrigue you.

Well, Lafferty's right about one thing concerning Palin. The American people? 47 percent of them view her negatively compared to 38 percent who view her positively.

Oh, they get it, all right.

Maps and Legends

I love CNN's Electoral Map Calculator. Especially the way it stands now. Just look at it. If you give all the "safe" and "leaning" states to the respective candidates, there is no way McCain wins. Even if you're exceedingly generous and give all the toss-up states to McCain, he still loses. In fact, the only way he wins is if he keeps all his states, takes all the toss-ups, and somehow manages to peel a few of Obama's away. Awesome. Totally awesome.

The Art of Relaxating

With Dr. Ronald Chevalier

This is for all the Flight of the Conchords fans in the 'ville who are all like, "When the fook is the new season going to start already, Maude?!" and finding that even exercising on your stationary bike while your best mate times you isn't keeping the dogs of WANT at bay anymore.

[Via Vesper.]

The World Will Go 'Round at Least Once More

No sooner had I read NeddieJingo waxing romantic about Obama's signage in comments than I received the following in an email from my friend Jason, who'd evidently just read the latest News from Shakes Manor: "When I see an Obama sign, I am repulsed because I hate Pepsi."

Ha.

In other news, you say potato and I say potahto.