Breaking Vlad?

Breaking Vlad?
Mick Zano

Here we go again. Everything the republicans predicted about Russian tanks in the Ukraine…uh, tanked. Is the Russian Bear on the Prowl? Is a New Cold War Inevitable? Is Obama’s Weakness to Blame? One easy trick to being a wonk these days is to just stick the word NO after each and every Fox or Drudge headline. It’s kind of a trade secret, so shhh. Shock poll: Foxeteers still shocked by this fact. Predictably, Putin never took another step after his Crimean Vacation. To cut to the Chevy Chase, Angela Merkel just spanked him so he’s now sending eCards to Obama. Aren’t you glad you rely on a spoof news site for your actual news? Discord has exclusive info on this world leader teleconference. Hit full story.

This week German Chancellor Angela Merkel laid the Krauthammer down, so to speak, and helped broker a real and hopefully lasting ceasefire in eastern Ukraine. The Discord has exclusive information on what transpired during this historic phone conversation:

Merkel: Vladimir, darling, it’s time for you to take your little guns and tanks and go home.

Putin: But can’t I play just a little longer?

Merkel: Certainly, as long as you don’t mind a much lower allowance.

Putin: Yes, ma’am.

Obama: Hot dang, you go girlfriend!

Merkel: Barack Hussein Obama, hang up this phone immediately! I thought we already talked about this!

Obama: Yes ma’am.

(click)

This conversation, in turn, caused Putin to send Obama some high-end vodka and a little Thinking of You card this week, full story here.  I want to state again for the record, I’m not trying play the I told you so card, but I am trying to play the I’m sure the WWIII thing would have worked out well for a President McCain or a President Romney card.

Key Point: any 21st century election of a republican president—with absolutely no ties left to something called reality—would spell disaster for this planet. They would spell it wrong, of course.

So a spoof news blogger has more insight than an entire political party? That should be a kick in the teeth…um, if their base had any. Sorry, gotta have some fun. Thankfully, Medicaid Expansion is fixing some of their teeth, here, so maybe I’ll have my chance yet.

I admit this Ukraine scenario started off weird. Republicans say all kinds of dumb shit, every day, incessantly in fact, but typically nothing pans out. It’s like reverse magic, but the invasion of Crimea and Russia’s threatening posture toward Ukraine was predicted by folks like Romney and Palin. In fact, Palin said she could actually see this all unfold from her house. I don’t think anyone could have foreseen the shaky situation in the Ukraine and the co-occuring mess in Moscow that made all of this possible. Never the less, the GOP predicted something that actually happened, on Earth, in this dimension, which is almost unprecedented in the 21st century.

However, as things started to ramp up my message to the republicans was don’t pop your champagne bottles just yet. Remember, even when it looks like that one in ten shot is coming through for them, never underestimate the ability of the GOP to get it wrong.

Coming from a conservative perspective, here is what fellow Discord contributor Pokey McDooris had to say on the matter:

“Remember when President Obama boldly drew that red line in the sand with Syria over the use of chemical weapons only to have Daddy Vladdy step in and take over for Baby Bama? I would suggest to you that Vladimir Putin encouraged Syria to step passed that red line and to call Obama’s bluff. I would also suggest to you that Vladimir Putin has been encouraging Iran to develop a nuclear bomb.”

Pokey McDooris

(Hint of the Day: coming from a conservative perspective is synonymous with dead wrong):

Remember, they can’t discern chess from checkers or see the forest for the Kievs. Here’s my only retort for that deductive gem:

Syria Disarms, Despite Republican Opposition
Syria Disarms, Despite Republican Opposition, The Discord got this one right and...uh...that's about it.
The Discord got this one right and…uh…that’s about it.

Here was my rebuttal quote at the time:

“Putin’s options suck, especially if he goes one step further. You see, the world runs on something called money—a fact your side insists upon—so the projected long term benefits for Russia, post this little annexation exercise, looks grim. He can’t occupy the Ukraine, easily, and all the other former Soviet borderlands are already sending Angela Merkel flowers and chocolate. It was a fool move, thus the right’s ability to predict it. Republicans have fool moves down to a…oh wait, they don’t believe in science.”

—Mick Zano, Putin Is Not Playing Chess, Crimea Is More of a Fisher-Price Thing

Post the invasion and annexation of Crimea, republicans were convinced a weak Obama had allowed Russia to creep back into a position of power. Of course, nothing could be further from truth (hint: republicans can never be farther from the truth, which is also covered in my Quandumb Mechanics theory and the Zanoberg Principle.

I said, from the beginning, this was a move made from desperation that would ultimately backfire. Putin was never going to come out of this smelling like roses. He did have an opportunity to crash the global economy, for sure, but that was the extent of this “power move”.

Since then—and at least in part because of the annexation of Crimea and the subsequent sanctions—Russia is on the verge of another recession and Putin is receiving the economic message from the rest of world, loud and clear.

I encourage everyone to just take a moment to really absorb each news cycle. Look at each conservative prediction, on any given topic, and then do something they refuse to do, look at what ultimately happened a few weeks or months later. It’s uncanny. If I end up wrong on a major issue, it’s probably going to come when I ignore my instincts and say to myself, naaah, they have to be wrong again. This is very dangerous and may well be by design, but whose? This has been my fear all along, republicans will cover an important truth in a pile of their usual Foxel matter.

…perhaps, but not today.

I believe 21st century Republicans have invented their own reality. The consequences of this can be minimized if we continue to keep them out of office.  Don’t boycott businesses for someone’s religious beliefs! Don’t come down to their level. What you need to do is vote in the mother-blanking midterms, you mooching, socialist hipsters before I slap that PBR out of your hand.

Breaking: Alex Bone Has an Alien Chest-Buster Living Inside Him

Alex Bone

Collapsing Shack, AZ—This week, quiet unexpectedly, Alex Bone called for a press conference at the Discord Tower and almost four people showed up, well, if you count Ballz and Zano. Once they had settled into Mr. Winslow’s bean bag bunny chairs, Boneman cleared his throat and addressed the historic assemblage:

“I am announcing today that I have been infected with an Alien Chest-buster,” said Bone. “As you may know, these beings typically gnaw their way through a person’s chest in a matter of hours. I, however, have survived with this one living inside me for over three weeks now!”

He raised a finger, as if to emphasize a point, but then quickly lowered it and raised a bottle of IPA instead. “How have I done this, you ask? How have I succeeded where others have just burst apart by now? (Burp.) It’s simple, it involves eating the right combination of beer and hamburgers. I’ve found that as long as I drink about forty beers a day and eat ten hamburgers an hour, the little guy seems content enough. In fact, I have named him Snookie-wookie.”

He stopped to rub his tummy, slammed down a hamburger in three bites, and then chugged two beers. His eyes then misted over a little. “The rest of you men have no idea what it’s like to feel a life growing inside of you. It is a magical… oh, we have a question. Yes, Zano.”

“Is this why all the communal beer has gone missing this week?”

Bone mumbled something, before saying, “Next question.”

When no one asked him anything, he looked at Ballz and said, “You had a question?”

“No I didn’t.”

“No, I think you did.”

After an awkward pause, Ballz said, “Don’t the aliens grow pretty quickly after they burst out of their victims? Why hasn’t this one just grown through you?”

“A very good question… I have no idea. Maybe it loves its new mommy.”

“And my beer,” added Zano.

After Bone kept his audience from wandering away with a promise of sharing his cheeseburger stash, he said, “So I’m sure all of you are wondering what’s next from here.”

“Were you?” Zano asked Ballz.

“Not really.”

Bone hurried down another hamburger and then chugged an IPA, before he held up a glossy covered book that read An Alien Inside: Skip the Beer and Stand Clear.

“We are going to have a book signing tour!” said Bone. “After the talk show circuit I plan to… Hey, come back, I’m not done yet. Maybe you guys could try to dress up like Aliens when I open my new hamburger chain. Can you guys sing Ragtime Gal, by chance? I’m calling it Buster Burgers and each burger comes with a side of a highly corrosive acid for a dipping sauce. Get it? And you should see what we’re using instead of fries. Guys… guys? Oh, can someone run down to Diablo Burger and the Pay-n-Take? It’s kind of an emergency.

Breaking: Alex Bone has an Alien Chest-Buster Living Inside Him

Apology VXIC: Yes, We Can No Longer Count This High in Roman Numerals

Apology VXIC: Yes, We Can No Longer Count this High in Roman Numerals

There is simply no excuse for our recent feature: GOP Critical of Japanese Response to Giant Lizard. As it turns out, Godzilla never attacked Japan in his latest rampage. Instead, the king of the monsters headed to San Francisco, thus the Golden Gate Bridge scene in the preview. Zano wrote the article and submitted it a few weeks prior to actually seeing the movie. After I noticed the error, this is his email response:

“Damnit Winslow! There are only a few things one can count on in this troubled world and Godzilla’s ongoing desire to destroy Tokyo is high among them. Post Fukushima, Godzilla, a creature attracted to radiation, should have been even more inclined to return to his favorite stomping grounds, pardon the pun. Besides, any attack on San Francisco should have been better coordinated with our national gay pride day, which occurred a mere two months after the release. Besides, why not just Photoshop Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S (2003) onto the image? Do I have to think of everything? Hey, why not watch the film first to make sure he actually attacks Tokyo in this version. You can even use my Netflix password, which is Winslow = Douche.”

For Zano’s submission Ten Children Vanish During Jackson’s Cirque du Soleil Performance, which was late by the way, I pointed out how Cirque du Soleil hails from Canada, not France. He told me the troupe left France, “to avoid the lousy customer service and nasty smells associated with their cities.”

Finally, as it turns out, you cannot use an equal sign in a Netflix password. This is another of his mistakes within mistakes, a phenomenon we have come all to accustom to here at The Daily Discord.

Pierce X. Winslow, CEO

P.S. Oh, and The Onion is never going to hire you, so stop being such a whiney bitch.

GM Claims Fiery Crash New Feature Not Design Flaw

GM Claims Fiery Crash New Feature Not Design Flaw

“Oh, and don’t forget to test drive our new Zippo Surprise series. We filled all of our airbags with butane. Just think of the fun!” continued Barra.

When asked why none of these vehicles are being recalled, she said, “Because we meant to do this. Don’t you get it? We’ve even studied the 1970 Pinto extensively to see how they did it. Lethality is now an important part of the GM experience. It captures the essence of the new Detroit. If you are in a serious car accident, do you really want to gimp around in pain the rest of your life or spend tens of thousands on medical bills? No, you want to burst into flames like that Fast & Furious guy or Richard Pryor. What, too soon? Some afterlife or another, you’ll thank us—except maybe that small percentage of drivers who survive and end up on a burn unit somewhere.”

General Motors believes such innovative features like these are the future… “at least for those people who drive our cars and don’t really have a future,” added Barra.

Guided by Voices: Crescent Ballroom, Phoenix 6/15/14

Tony Ballz

There isn’t much happening in this whitebread shitkicker state that makes me want to leave my comfortable womb up here in Cowtown. Guided By Voices playing in Phoenix on a Sunday night did the trick.

Bro and I do not own vehicles so we hopped aboard the shuttle on a bright sunny Sunday afternoon, excited at the serious drinkin’ and rockin’ soon to commence. As usual, I zonked out by Munds Park and woke up around Black Canyon City. I managed not to drool on my Bill Hicks t-shirt.

We arrived at the airport and stepped into the oppressive Phoenix heat. I felt a vague urge to hibernate during the day and stay up all night on schwag speed. We took the Sky Train to the Light Rail, which was well-maintained and convenient but only because it was 7pm and our destination was literally one block from the Van Buren station.

Several of my Valley friends have waxed poetic regarding the wonders of Phoenix’s timid foray into public transportation: “I just hopped right on and it dropped me a mile from my house! Isn’t that awesome?”

No, it’s not. The Light Rail might qualify for awesome if this was 1964. For a metropolis in 2014 with 4.3 million residents, it’s pathetic. Other U.S. cities have buses and trains that take you anywhere you want, anytime. Here in good ol’ Arizonee the whole damn system shuts down from midnight til 6am. Why? Because you kids should be home asleep, that’s why. Only lowlifes are awake that late.

As the sun set, we sat on the Crescent Ballroom’s patio and consumed beers and shots and tacos while enjoying the Downtown Phoenix Aging Hipster Parade. I discovered one of Bro’s shameful secrets: he’s a beaner who hates cilantro. May God have mercy on your eternal soul, Bro.

We saw a woman with a GBV tattoo and got excited. Our vague hopes of finding two available ladies (of any age) who were rabid fans of drunk power pop performed by men in their 50s were dashed when we remembered where we were.

For the unenlightened, Guided By Voices is a rock band from Dayton, Ohio that has intermittently existed since 1983. The man behind the curtain is 56-year-old Robert Ellsworth Pollard Jr: former 4th grade English teacher and mild mannered family man by day, beer chuggin’, mike twirlin’, high kickin’, rock and roll golden god by night.

GBV’s reputation rests on their energetic sloppy alcohol-fueled marathon live shows, and the Phoenix gig sure delivered. Toward the beginning of the set, Pollard uncapped an ice cold handle of tequila, took a few gulps, and surrendered the rest to the audience. I had trouble deciding which songs to miss for a bathroom run. I would be mid-pee and hear them start a real good one and curse my weak bladder.

And holy crap, they played Motor Away and Game Of Pricks and Echos Myron and Teenage FBI and Tractor Rape Chain and A Good Flying Bird and Gold Star For Robot Boy and Exit Flagger and A Salty Salute and Wished I Was A Giant and Awful Bliss and 14 Cheerleader Coldfront and The Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory and Cut-Out Witch and I Am A Scientist … about 40 tunes in all. Goddamn!

From a high like that there was nowhere to go but down, and down we went. Bro got into an argument with a bartender and they all glared as we inhaled our post-show nachos. We had to catch the earliest shuttle home since Bro worked in the morning, so back to the airport we did go. Of course it was past midnight, no train or bus, so a cab was our only option.

Sky Harbor to Crescent Ballroom via Light Rail = $4 (2 tickets)

Crescent Ballroom to Sky Harbor via taxi = $24 + tip

Fuck you, Phoenix.

Sky Harbor Airport is probably the only public spot in the Valley where two drunken lunatics like us could wander around at 2am without getting arrested. I highly recommend it. We didn’t go sliding down the luggage ramps or anything, we just had the complete run of Terminal Four without one sign of Airport Security. It kind of felt like The Langoliers.

We did manage to smoke a bowl outside in the departures area. I dimly recall yelling “GBV!” through the empty tunnel while eating leftover nachos. Somewhere in here we discovered the Starbucks was open and I got a tasty iced chai. Then we went back outside and smoked another bowl.

It was fun until the booze wore off, then it sucked. We still had hours to kill, so Bro crashed on the floor while I slumped in a chair like a sack of spuds. When 7am rolled around we found that they had overbooked the shuttle, so eleven of us crammed into a vehicle designed for eight.

Sweating and hung over, I was wide awake the whole 3 hour ride up. The Korean tourist to my right kept falling asleep on my shoulder while Bro lost his lunch in a plastic bag directly behind me. After finally disembarking, I rode my bike homeward into some of the worst gale-force winds I’d ever experienced in Flagstaff.

I got home, drank about a half-gallon of water and fell in bed. I said a quick prayer to Jah for Bro and the workday ahead of him. Luckily I was unemployed and had no such responsibilities.

Maybe I should get a car.

Mount Rushmore: What Went Right and Wrong

Mount Rushmore: What went Right and Wrong
Pete Christensen

Mount Rushmore was built on The Six Grandfathers Mountain of South Dakota on land stolen from the Lakota Sioux in the war of 1876 to 1877. The name was changed to “Rushmore” to honor a wealthy East Coast banker by Carrie Swancey, the sister of Laura Ingalls Wilder, who later went on to name Washington’s professional football team. Okay, strike that last part…

The monument was first proposed by Doane Robinson in 1923 to increase Black Hills tourism and to celebrate the first 150 years of North America’s history. If only they’d just gone with my idea of a nice parade.

The original sculptures were Guston Borglum and his understudy Korczak Ziolkowski. The initial idea was to honor five key people:

  1. Lewis and Clark (those who explored the West).
  2. Chief Joseph of the Nez Pierce (those who inhabited the West).
  3. Wild Bill Hickok (those who tamed the West), and:
  4. William F. Cody, also known as Buffalo Bill Wildwings (those who kept the Western spirit alive through the use of spicy sauces).

However, when President Coolidge got involved, he demanded the idea involve politicians (go figure). Borglum, who’d become famous by carving the Confederate Memorial on Stone Mountain, Georgia wasn’t really interested in the idea of a Native American sculpture, an idea championed by his partner Ziolkowski.

In 1925 Borglum settled on an immense figure of a young George Washington in a three cornered hat. Funding ran out so they considered a two cornered hat for a time. To avoid controversy, and secure funding, Coolidge insisted on two democrats and another Republican joining Washington.

Several times attempts were made in congress to add figures to Jefferson, Roosevelt, Washington, and Jackson, who were eventually told they should watch their own figures. These other proposals ranged from Ronald Reagan, John F. Kennedy, and astronaut Neil Armstrong. All were defeated, so in 2010 The Daily Discord nominated Rush Limbaugh and rock singer, Geddy Lee, but only because they were trying to be clever.

Despite a public outcry to add Susan B. Anthony in 1937, the project went forward as planned. Ziolkowski left the project when partially completed, as some claim Teddy Roosevelt’s chin frustrated him greatly.

The state of South Dakota has made millions from Mount Rushmore. The Sioux nation has sued for one-tenth of one, one hundredth percent of the money earned from “Black Hills Gold‟. They’ve repeatedly been defeated in both state and federal courts. Not because they’re wrong, but because reparations on this large a scale is a slippery slope, one the United States can’t afford to get involved in. Instead, a portion of all proceeds from Mt. Rushmore tourism should be awarded to the Sioux Nation, to be used strictly for education and job development.

In 1939, at the request of Chief Henry Standing Bear, Ziolkowski began work on the Crazy Horse Monument. Crazy Horse never had his picture taken. His image is depicted purely from spoken descriptions and folklore. He was stabbed in the back by Army scout Little Big Man and died shortly after. The army buried the Oglala Sioux leader in a deliberately hidden grave.

Despite twice being offered ten million dollars by the federal government to complete the project, the family has refused. It should take another thirty years to complete this project and it will be eight times bigger than Mt. Rushmore once complete. It will be indisputably the largest sculpture in the entire world.

Oil Tanker Sinks Off Coast of Japan: No Monsters Take Responsibility

Oil Tanker Sinks off Coast of Japan: No Monsters Take Responsibility

The Japanese Coast Guard has ruled out Gamera, the giant flying turtle, mainly because he vowed never to return after his last film totally flopped in the box office. In his defense, Gamera the Brave (2006) did really suck. Mothra is generally considered to be a good monster and only occasionally sinks ships. These incidents typically occur when he mistakes the vessel’s standard navigational beacon as a giant porch light.

The Prime Minister of Japan is completely stumped, “Why won’t Americans learn the metric system? It makes so much more sense.” In the culturally insensitive version of this post, he also said, “What is wong with you woosers!”

Nuclear engineer Homer Simpson of Springfield said, “On a good note, the crude oil from the ship is likely to have absorbed .0000000001 percent of the Fukushima radiation.” When someone explained to how the tanker was empty at the time of the explosion, Mr. Simpson added, “Doh, doh Godzilla!”

After his remarks Mr. Simpson was later sued by the band Blue Öyster Cult for copyright infringement…after which he may have added a, “Doh!”

Benghazi Is an Important Scandal: a Republican One

Mick Zano

Now that the mastermind behind the Benghazi attack is in custody and has allegedly cited the video as the main impetus…uh, who cares? As Hillary said, “Why does it matter?” This was extrapolated by Fox to mean, “Why does it matter four Americans died?” They did this because they lie. That’s not news; they lie every news cycle, but what’s always been interesting to me about this particular “scandal” is how little sense it makes, even by typical Fox News standards. Heh, heh…Fox News standards.

No attempt to make this a scandal has worked and, remember, the GOP came at this from more angles than Pythagoras on crack, during his OCD period. Fox News’s last angle, the Obama knew all along it wasn’t the video that triggered the attack, just collapsed. So even their inane, picky nonsensical shit that no one understands (IPNSTNOU) isn’t panning out. The GOP is like Felix Unger with ADHD, after the head injury episode. Apparently, in several private conversations, Khatallah moved up the attack date after being enraged by an American anti-Islam video, or:

“So, of course, the attacks were linked to the dozens of other embassies overrun on the same day. If the GOP can’t connect those dots, we’re going to need some bigger dots. That is why the attack fell right on movie-trailer night. They used the riots as an excuse…you know, to do the old fake yawn and reach around thing. You think this just happened at the precise moment all of those other protests?”

Mick Zano, 11/19/12

Isn’t it time to hold republicans accountable for their lies? My quote came soon after the attacks and, let’s be clear, I don’t really care about this part. Who would? Yet, the people who studied this shit, for years, still couldn’t create anything meaningful out of their bullshit, or:

Dear Rick Santorum,

Maybe it’s republicanism, not homosexuality that leads to bestiality…uh, because you people seem to always screw the pooch.

Sincerely,

Reality.

P.S. Wag more, bark less. Woof.

I don’t care about being right, I care that these same wing-nuts are now in position to win the midterms. Imposition? The imposition, here we go, the imposition, what a show. What movie?

Here’s a review of the real culpability on Benghazi:

1. Republicans chose to defund embassy security about a year before the attack.

(I guess hindsight is AK-47.)

2. This ongoing Benghazi distraction greatly diminished the death of Ambassador Stevens and his life’s work, here. And, as a direct result of Project Issa, 21 embassies have closed across the Middle East.

(Hey, but saving on embassy security reduced the deficit by .0000001, while greatly increasing the likelihood of another war, aka, another win win for our fiscally conservative neocons.)

3. The right all but ended the promising career of Susan Rice, not out of some misunderstanding, but from sheer bullshit, aka, the fuel of choice over at the Fox Nation

(Keystone Poopline?)

Fun fact: Republicans no longer require facts, fun or otherwise.

4. Republicans have, once again, wasted millions of tax payer’s dollars on legal fees, special committees, and Obama voodoo dolls. Shouldn’t they pay us back?

(…with interest?)

(Close Guantanamo and open GOPtanamo? Kidding, why feed them? It’s a welfare program.)

The only small difference between my list and theirs is this: reality. These are all facts. Essentially, Bush showed us how ineffective broader military campaigns can be and, now, his friends are making Obama’s weapon of choice, diplomacy, a much harder proposition. I guess having fewer embassy attacks on your watch and then bringing those responsible to justice is the new republican definition of incompetence.

All of the right’s arguments on this “scandal” have been dismantled, which only seems to embolden them. It’s like a wounded animal, on ludes. Here’s what’s next from a stronger, wronger Fox:

Is Obama “Fixing” Khatallah’s Confession?

Amnesty Deal in the Works for Benghazi Mastermind?

The Truth Won’t Stop Next Issa Investigation

Was Hillary Watching Twilight Marathon During Benghazi?

Honestly, I think that last one is true. I have Googled the dates. Hillary, prepare for this one in the debates.

Today, Fox News is interviewing the evil genius known as Alberto Gonzalez—in your spare time, please remove the word genius—about this matter, here. Will the right’s infatuation with people who suck ever end? (Hint: no.) That would start a dumbino effect and could lead to something called rationality. My 2008 dismantling of Bush’s Attorney General, here.

Conservatives should be happy Khattalah was brought to justice—and, if they cared about embassy security, they should fund it next time. If such things mattered to them, wouldn’t they know how many attacks occurred under Bush? Incidentally, no one does, because when you factor in Baghdad, the number is too high to track. Back then their excuse was “we’re fighting them there so we didn’t have to fight them here.” Of course, the they in question weren’t there, until we went there. Now, hear ye, hear ye, they are there…uh …but here? Them’s the facts. And, the only ones who never seem to notice when their arguments fall apart, is them. There, I said it.

Case in point, Iraq is now Obama’s fault. Who knew? My take here.

In the end, it doesn’t matter. The right wing media desperately wanted to create a false reality and, at this point, they have succeeded. On a national scale my arguments are clearly losing ground. It doesn’t mean they’re wrong, it just means propaganda is often more effective. This may come as a shock to some of you, but O’Reilly is beating me in all timeslots, for all age groups, in all places on earth…except maybe Portlandia. Woot! Meanwhile, on behalf of reality: you all owe Ambassador Stevens and Susan Rice an apology…oh, and while you’re at it, ME! I could have obviously spent my time more wisely.

[Midget porn joke omitted by the editor.]

Today the New York Post is running a story suggesting Hillary didn’t believe it was the video that triggered the attack, here. This is what worries me—at times Hillary seems to be more neocon than a liberal. Sometimes there isn’t nearly as much light between her and republicans as I would like. She is distancing herself from Obama for all the wrong reasons. She knows the right’s fantasy narrative is gripping our nation, so she’s feeding into it in the hopes of some political gain. She’s a sellout. I don’t think we need to distance ourselves from issues that Obama got right.

But lest we forget this Fox News gem:

Fox News: “We Stand By Our Reporting On Benghazi”

Well, I too stand by my coverage of this issue, here, here, and here. And, once again, I beat an entire network of goofballs. Look, uh…if I’m a spoof news blogger, what exactly are you people supposed to be? I’m afraid republicans have broken the Flynn Effect over their dunce caps.

Okay. I’ll end with another of my nuggets, only because the last IF in this little equation was finally answered today and, as usual, the right is wrong on all counts. Lucky for them, they can’t count.

Sage-like Prophets Predict Iraqi Problems…in 2007

Mick Zano

Did you see the parade of war criminals surface all across the Fox Nation this week? You know, the ones who never got anything right about Iraq and should be in jail? They have more advice now that Iraq is descending into a civil war. Fox also started running endless 2007 republican Surge-justification-quotes (SJQ). Here’s the thing, saying Iraq will fall apart without U.S. support in 2007 is kind of like Churchill, instead of his famous 1940 speech, saying, “You know, I think Hitler’s up to something.”

Here’s the first wisdom nugget:

“You could see in the Shia south, the Iranians reaching over and grabbing to take power. You could see in the Sunni northwest, the Al-Qaeda folks taking power and leadership in that area.”

Mitt Romney (2007)

Fox says this was so “eerily accurate” that he must have had a “time machine”. I would like to add that, because he’s a republican, he must have set the controls wrong on that thing. Uh…because most of us figured that shit out back in ‘04, three years earlier. Romney’s ‘insight’ is like saying, “you know, the Alamo is going to be really nasty” while a guest on Anderson Cooper tonight.

Here’s the 2nd wisdom nugget:

President Bush’s Dire Warning Ignored!
President Bush’s Dire Warning Ignored! Tell us more, oh Nostradumbass
Tell us more, oh Nostradumbass

Well, look who’s still talking? Make no mistake, republican’s revisionist history for this time period is now complete. Their conclusion: if only we’d listened to George W. Bush on Iraq. Sadly, it’s really no worse than the rest of their conclusions. I guess we can close that chapter from The World According to GOP. How about this one, Bush Accurately Predicts Own Incompetence on Handling of Iraq, or, better yet:

Captain Obvious

What they lack in brains, they make up for in balls. Republicans are so far beyond absurd, they can no longer even see absurd from their flying unicorns. The Iraq War is something I got right, not in 2007, in two thousand & fucking two. More importantly it’s one of the things Obama got right, in fact, it’s why he’s president. Forgot that part, huh? It’s also why I chose Obama over Hillary. So to hear a bunch of architects of one of the greatest foreign policy blunders in our nation’s history say “told you so” is astounding, even by normal republican delusional standards (NRDS).

NERDS!!! Wait, we are the nerds and the jocks…so republicans are the, uh, I’m going to have to peruse my high school yearbook and get back to you.

Colin Powell warned Bush, “You break it, you bought it” and “you know you’re going to own this place, right?” That doesn’t excuse his anthrax performance, but it still shows some insight, which was sorely lacking with that bunch.

But everyone knew by 2007—even republicans knew—there were no good answers in Iraq by 2007. It’s that same time delay I keep talking about. It takes years before information is properly processed by…oh, who am kidding? They can’t process information.

Admittedly, Romney’s speech lays out one important detail, and details are often lacking in the GOP’s foreign policy rhetoric. His sage like advice from that quote on Iraq also included:

“Handle carefully.”

—Mitt Romney (2007)

I’m not kidding, that was the only advice after he stated the obvious. So we didn’t handle Iraq carefully between 2003 to 2013. Damn it, guys! I said bomb the shit out of Baghdad, carefully. Maybe Iraq needed a giant warning label scrawled across the country, Handle with Care, or the Shiite could hit the Fallujah. Or, maybe, with the aid of drone strikes, we could have spelled out Fragile, so Palin could see it from her house. I think historians will be wrestling with questions like this forever, well, historians from the Heritage Foundation on ‘shrooms.

The “eerily accurate” quotes our friends on the right keep citing this week come from the ramp-up to the “Surge”, which I felt only acted as a Bushian human shield—you know, so he could quietly sneak away to go paint, or clear brush, or conduct some other task more suitable to his relative skill set, or:

“The closing of the American Mind under Rove’s direction seems almost complete. The Republican Party, however, has brought the concept of denial to levels unrealized since Pee Wee Herman’s dream of a new unsupervised playhouse.  Now, the catastrophic decisions by Bush and co. are swept away by the success of ‘the surge,’ which equates to a billion dollar a week pause button in the endless clusterfuck that is the Iraq War.”

Mick Zano (2008)

Unfortunately this site only goes back to 2008, but here’s a fun Iraqi review:

1. Bush lied and started a war (see Downing Street memo).

2. The resistance to the occupiers escalated after we disbanded the whole Iraqi army (fun fact: they’re now an important part of ISIS).

3. Another fun fact: ISIS is the Egyptian Goddess of what are republicans smoking.

4. We propped up a Shiite, Maliki, who hates Sunnis. Who could have foreseen that that would become an issue? (Fun fact: he tried to have his Sunni VP killed, which was all part of Bush’s: Operation Iraq 1776).

5. Regional ethnic cleansing began, neighborhood by neighborhood (fun fact: Sunnis Shiites and republicans were all cool with this because they stopped shooting at Americans for a brief period. Winning!)

6. Years later, the election of Maliki bolstered Iran’s position and power in the region, which is still true today (Fun fact: isn’t that fun enough?)

7. During a pause in the civil war, at the conclusion of this ethnic cleansing, Bush “Surged” by sending more troops under Operation: please just kill each other not our troops long enough so I can leave office.

8. Al-Qaeda, who were never even in Iraq under Saddam, moved into the vacuum of power (this started under Bush and continued under Obama, which, of course = impeach Obama).

9. The marginalized Sunni’s waited very patiently to take revenge on the Shiite majority (this was set to begin whenever the fuck we wised up and left).

10. Civil War is beginning now (see: duh).

11. We reached number 11! Because my tutorials go to eleven! If that weren’t enough, the whole invasion sparked a more regional Sunni Shiite war across the Middle East, predicated by many before we invaded, including Bush’s daddy. But Bush Jr. has daddy issues so as a result hundreds of thousands of people died. (Fun fact: this example is the only time Freud was ever right about something psychological.)

So let me get this straight, the guy who didn’t want us to invade Iraq in the first place, Obama, is now wrong and the people who figured out we were fucked, a few years later than anyone else, are the new brain trusts? Really? Is that what the history books will say? Hey, why not add Bush and Jesus riding into Baghdad on dinosaurs? What? Too soon?

Reality Check:

A few years back during my 21st century scorecard, out of 14 of the most important issues of our time, the GOP only got one full point for “The Surge”, but with this caveat:

“Oh, and when Iraq completely descends back into chaos, I’m taking that “Surge” point back! I hope to hell it doesn’t happen, but I have to contend with something they don’t, reality.”

Mick Zano

Today, I’m taking back that point, right on cue. So the republican collective has yet to get any significant issue right…in this century! Hell, most real issues aren’t even identified yet by this bunch, story here. See my full two-parter takedown here, part 1 and part 2. Every word still rings true, especially the part about Smurfs. Hint: my comments tend to remain valid while their comments typically have a shorter shelf life than the Mad Cow meatloaf over at the Roadkill Café.

You can’t take something you totally got wrong and try to twist it into some type of anti-Obama argument. Oh, that’s right, that’s all you do. But this is offensive to those of us who got it right before the war and, especially, those who served and suffered because of these lies and blunders. As I have repeated ad infinitum, we will never change the mind of a single Foxeteer—that, in and of itself, is part of the problem. So, more importantly, we need to work together to keep them out of office. Organize for the midterms. Register as a Democrat and then, some day, when we once again have two viable parties in this country, you can switch back to independent. Until then, Go Hillary!