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January 25, 2010
The Gang That Couldn’t Vote Straight
You may have heard that Massachusetts’s voters recently elected Scott Brown to fill the seat left vacant by the passing of Senator Ted Kennedy. It was in most of the papers.
Scott Brown defeated Attorney General Martha Chokely, whose campaign strategy seemed to follow Woody Allen’s advice that “80 percent of success is showing up.”
Indeed, Ms. Chokely seemed to think that just by being a Democrat running for the seat long-held by the “Liberal Lion,” that she was automatically entitled to it.
She scorned the idea of spending time outside of Fenway Park on a cold day, shaking hands. You know what, Martha? That’s what politicians running for office do!
Ted Kennedy would go out and campaign…even when running unopposed! Although, after seeing her lackluster campaign, I get the feeling that if she had run unopposed, she STILL would’ve lost.
When it came out that former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling was endorsing Brown, Chokely joked that he (Schilling) was probably a Yankees fan. Good to see that Martha is keeping John Kerry’s joke writers employed. Maybe she can take over the Tonight Show when Jay gets fired again. Why do Democrats think they’re funny? They’ve got a professional comedy writer, Al Franken in their midst. Couldn’t he run a remedial comedy class for them?
In fairness, Brown ran a great campaign.
“I’m Scott Brown and I drive a truck,” was pretty much all it took to defeat Martha (He didn’t tell us what kind of mileage he got on it, though). I’m not sure if there’s a precedent for that campaign slogan.
“I’m Abe Lincoln, and I split rails.”
The press noted with a wink and a chuckle that Brown had posed nude for Cosmopolitan Magazine in 1982. I’m not sure if there’s a precedent for that, either.
“The Saturday Evening Post Presents William Howard Taft, America’s Sexiest Man!”
At 340 pounds, there was just more of him to love. Remember, they liked ‘em big back then.
Had the shoe been on the other foot, wait…that’s probably a bad metaphor, had there been nude photos of Martha (sorry for planting that image in your head) that surfaced instead of Brown, I suspect that the “Family Values” crowd would have deemed her unfit to run for such a lofty office. Of course, had the Fairness Doctrine still been in place, Martha would have been within her rights to demand to pose nude also. Perhaps we may yet see that “The Ladies of the Attorney General’s Office” layout in Playboy.
Martha Chokely was the 1978 Boston Red Sox blowing a 14 1/2 game lead to the New York Yankees. Martha Chokely was Bill Buckner booting a squibbed ground ball to first base. Martha Chokely was Mike Torrez giving up a bloop home run to Bucky Dent (Yes, despite World Series Championships in 2004 and 2007, the pre-2004 Red Sox remain the Gold Standard for blowing a sure thing). Okay…to throw in one non-Red Sox reference, Martha Chokely was Scott Norwood missing an easy field goal that would’ve won the Super Bowl. And you Sox fans think we’re the only ones whose team tortures us?
The election now gives the Democrats what seems to be a 59-41 minority. Only the donkeys can screw up like that and turn an advantage into seeming to be a disadvantage. It’s kind of like former Red Sox pitcher Matt Young throwing a no-hitter and losing. Yes, if need a sports metaphor for screwing up, all you have to do is check Red Sox history between 1919-2003.
Now there’s a lot of excitement on the right about Scott Brown, as there was on the left about Barak Obama, and like Obama, the honeymoon period will eventually end and there will be a realization that the candidate can’t walk on water, and disappointment likely will set in. Sort of like being a Red Sox fan from 1919-2003.
As for Martha Chokely, she’s announced that she’s again running for reelection as Attorney General. Before she begins campaigning (assuming she does), she should buy a truck.
Now it is Scott Brown who will be moving to Washington, and he might need some help, but he can take a lot of stuff himself; after all, he has a truck.
Congratulation to Scott Brown, or as one man once said: “Heckuva job, Brownie.”
Posted by dmargarita at 1:32 PM
January 11, 2010
Great Balls of Fire!
By now you’ve probably heard that a Nigerian man on a flight landing in Detroit on Christmas Day, attempted to detonate a bomb sown into his underwear, which may explain why prior to boarding your plane you may now be asked, “Is that a bomb in your underwear, or are you just happy to see me?”
News reports have stated that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, was trained in Yemen, by a branch of Al Qaeda. It’s good to see that Al Qaeda is opening branch offices, because you can’t always get downtown to meet your terrorist needs.
Early speculation (by me) considered the possibility that he attempted suicide when he looked out the window and saw Detroit. Fortunately, alert passengers saw Abdulmutallab’s pants ablaze and quickly reacted, preventing his underwear from going off (There’s a sentence I never thought I’d say).
Mr. Abdulmutallab was not only unsuccessful in his task, he showed himself to be perhaps not the brightest star on the Christmas tr…okay, bad analogy. With trousers fuming, a flight attendant reportedly asked what he had in his pocket.
“Explosive device,” was his alleged reply.
Generally, suicide bombers don’t announce their intentions before doing their deed. Mind you, the successful ones don’t do any explaining afterwards.
This was after spending 20 minutes in the bathroom, which didn’t seem to arouse suspicion. Usually, when someone spends 20 minutes in the bathroom, it’s because of bad airplane food or joining the mile-high club.
Abdullah Asieria, a suicide bomber who attempted to assassinate a Saudi Arabian prince last year, certainly went above and beyond for his cause. He managed to get past security by putting his bomb where nobody was going to think of searching. Let’s just say it’s the punchline to the joke, “Rectum? Damn near killed ‘em!”
Mr. Asieri spent 30 hours near his target before setting it off. Think about that….30 hours concealing an explosive device there. I guess it didn’t seem suspicious when he lit that fuse. Considering where he was concealing the device, he must’ve moved around the room like he was a Minister of Silly Walks. I’m guessing that with an explosive device where the “sun don’t shine” for 30 hours, his disposition wasn’t the most pleasant, prompting the question, “What’s up his ass?”
Remarkably, he barely wounded the Saudi prince, but did manage to cause a mess. I mean, there was shit everywhere.
BA-DA-BOOM!
If the actions of Richard Reid, aka “The Shoe Bomber” resulted in us removing our shoes before getting on a plane, they may now resort to security agencies calling in the bum-sniffing dogs.
There have been calls from the political right to resort to racial profiling for potential flyers, but it wouldn’t have helped catch Reid, who was British, or Abdulmutallab, who was Nigerian. However, this could prove to be a hassle for the guy who plays the grapes in the Fruit of the Loom commercials.
Several proverbial red flags were missed in catching Abdulmutallab, including the fact that someone typing it onto the no-fly list misspelled his name. Either that person didn’t think to or was unable to do what I did in writing that name…copying and pasting. Hell, even Google questions your spelling when you screw up.
“Did you mean Elvis Presley?”
The most conspicuous gaffe was that that bomber’s dad contacted the U.S. Embassy, noting that his son was missing and had become radicalized. Common sense should’ve put U.S. security agencies on alert, not to mention that it was also the plot of a classic Leave it to Beaver episode.
“Now Beaver, always wear clean underwear in case you have to blow up a plane.”
Mr. Abdulmutallab apparently had the device sewn into his underwear, hidden “near his testicles” (that’s reported by Reuters, so don’t blame me). I’m sure somewhere a DHS agent will chuckle if you search Google for “bomber” & “near his testicles.”
Little did Jerry Lee Lewis realize that his song “Great Balls of Fire!” would someday take on a literal meaning.
Flyers used to be offered the choice of a “smoking” or “non-smoking” seat on an airport. It used to refer to cigarettes, not genitalia.
The real question here is, were they boxers or briefs?
Posted by dmargarita at 2:23 PM