Period Fashions for Natural Wonders?

For time immemorial, people have worn and appreciated the fashions of their times, only to be ridiculed by successive generations for their “awful” and “tacky” clothes, tastes, etc. This was true until recently, when fashion designers learned they could make far more money and make far less effort by simply tricking young people into wearing new versions of old, recycled styles, like bell-bottoms, “skinny” jeans, etc. But up until recently, slick swingers from any age would deck themselves out in the most fashionable attire and accessories imaginable to look totally cool and cutting-edge, just to be ridiculed by people in the future for how dated and ridiculous their clothing looks.

So, given that there are fashions in clothing, accessories, haircuts, etc., even in architecture and interior decorating and furnishings, that always seem to go out-of-style and become passé, I was wondering if there were natural landscapes that are tourist destinations that are fashionable for a time, and then become gauche in successive periods. Like for example, you know how the 1960s had many bright colors and natural, hippie fashions, only to be succeeded and replaced by the synthetic and artificial fabrics and styles of the 1970s? Well, what if people in the 1960s loved the open, natural, brightly-colored expanses of the Grand Canyon, and later generations found it to be garish and overblown and indulgent? Does this sort of thing ever occur?

I imagine people visiting the great redwood forests of Redwood National and State Parks in California, and saying: “This is just a bunch of big trees: who cares? Only stupid tree-huggers would be impressed by this, just because these trees are too big to hug!” And then I imagine others saying stuff like: “Look at all these bright, tacky colors! And it’s just a big hole in the ground anyway. Really, what’s so special about this so-called ‘Grand Canyon’? It’s just tacky! I can’t believe people used to like this thing; I’m so over it!” Or I imagine maybe someone else going to see “Old Faithful”, and saying: “Wow, it just sprays some water up every once-in-a-while? How boring! I guess back before video games and the Internet this was pretty cool, but it’s just dull and lame now. Where’s the variation? It’s just a one-trick-pony if you ask me. I can’t believe people used to think this was cool! And really: ‘Old Faithful’? Talk about jejune! Maybe that was cool back when people stayed married and stuff due to the social stigma of divorce, but nowadays it just makes it sound like it’s stodgy and prudish because no-one’s attracted to it, and it can’t get laid and ‘swing’ due to its lack of options: loser.” But then they all think Niagara Falls is wonderful.

And then, in another few years, everybody’s taste shifts again, and suddenly Niagara Falls has “jumped the shark”, and the natural wonder and beauty of the Grand Canyon is hot and hip again, while people are just moderately impressed by the “so-so” natural wonder of Yosemite National Park. And so and so, with tastes varying down future generations just like with clothing fashions. I wonder, does this actually happen?

Political Stunt Daredevils

I keep hearing about things that are described as a “political stunt”, and it always conjures up images in my head that are far more interesting and sensational than whatever they’re talking about. I can’t even think of an example of a “political stunt” I’ve heard about on the news panel shows, so that tells you right there that none of them are particularly daring or memorable. So then do these things really even deserve to be called “political stunts”?

No, for something to be called a “political stunt”, shouldn’t some candidate do some Evel Knievel-style motorcycle jump or something? Like, for example, they could have some Republican congressman who is opposed to President Obama’s healthcare bill dress up in a plushie elephant suit and attempt to jump a motorcycle over the entire 3,000 pages of the healthcare bill, laid all out side-by-side on the ground; and then, naturally he would fail to make the jump over all those pages, since the healthcare bill is so ridiculously long, and that would be the whole point of this “stunt” to begin with: that the healthcare bill is so enormous that not even a motorcycle can jump over it. And so he’d crash and wipe out; but unfortunately for him, because he’s opposed to the healthcare bill, he’s denied healthcare for his broken, mangled body, and he dies. And that, of course, is another, secret part of this “political stunt”; because when he dies, his other Republican buddies in Congress can say: “See? If Obamacare is so great, then how come our esteemed colleague died of his non-life-threatening injuries that he would easily have survived and recovered from by now had President Obama not destroyed our healthcare system and its quality of care with his left-wing Socialist takeover of the medical establishment! Yes, our esteemed colleague’s failure to successfully make that motorcycle jump is demonstrative of the failure of Obamacare’s government takeover of healthcare! It’s the perfect analogy to President Obama’s failed policies!” And then the dead political stunt daredevil’s obituary would read: “He dedicated his life to public service, and he died in a bitchin’ motorcycle jump crash that was totally rad, dude, proving once and for all that Obamacare is a failure!”

Then, some other guy, this time perhaps a right-wing political pundit, could dress up like Evel Knievel and try to jump a rocket-sled over some canyon that represents the federal budget deficit or the national debt. And what happens this time is that the rocket launches but fails to make it across the canyon, and the parachute fails, and the whole thing crashes and burns in the big gaping canyon. So this time, all the Republican pundits come out and say that this is the perfect metaphor for our country’s financial situation: The rocket-sled symbolizes our country, and as it tries to fly high over our country’s gaping, yawning hole in its federal budget, it stalled out and crashed and burned under the weight of such incredible pressure, yadda yadda. And that this crash is just like the way President Obama has crashed the American economy, etc. And that the guy dressed up in a leather American flag suit being burned alive is symbolic of President Obama’s secret Socialist flag-burning tendencies, etc.

And then future “political stunt” daredevils could do things like show a graph of our national debt, and then show the drastic spending increases that are coming down the pipe, so to speak, and it could look like that “hockey stick” graph form Al Gore’s movie An Inconvenient Truth, only to accentuate how high it’s going to get, rather than riding one of those little cranes up like Gore did, this guy could jump out of an airplane with a parachute that opens up to say: “2050 Spending Levels”, and then the parachute would fail, sending him plummeting to his death, which would demonstrate that without reforming our social programs, our country’s financial future will be like “jumping out of a plane without a parachute”.

And then, if that made a really big splash (I mean in the news, not just a big splash of blood on the ground), then they could go further and further with these “political stunts”. And next they could have someone who wants to cut spending give a campaign speech on the edge of a cliff with a megaphone, addressing the crowd below, and then they could say: “If we don’t fix our out-of-control spending soon, we’re going to spend ourselves right off of a cliff!” And then he could take a wad of cash out of his pocket, throw it into the air, and step off the cliff, falling to his death below. And that would probably make a real impression on everyone! (They would, of course, be warned ahead of time in the front rows to bring that clear plastic sheeting to use to protect themselves from all the splattering goo and stuff for when the guy lands at the base of the cliff, kind of like they do at Gallagher shows to keep all the watermelon juice off of everyone.)

And when people do these “stunts”, they will all have to wear like American flag suits and flashy helmets and stuff like that, just to rub it in to everyone that they’re political stunt daredevils! And posterity will remember them as the crazy, death-defying, didactic discourse distributors, pounding political polemics into our little sensationalism-hungry heads in a dazzling display of performance art daredevilry! And with political stunts like these, they would be sure to get their message across in a way we’d never forget it! Plus, if we could encourage them all (political pundits, partisan blowhards, etc.) to do this kind of stuff, maybe we’d get rid of some of these jackasses eventually this way.

And what a way to go, too, huh? Even I would fondly remember even the most asinine, self-important, narcissistic polemicist if they went out in a self-imposed “blaze of glory” like an Evel Knievel-style motorcycle jump “political stunt” of didactic daredevilry! Wouldn’t you?

In fact, when they burn all their bridges so as to become no longer employable, maybe this is how they ought to try to make a comeback: through some death-defying daredevil stunt to demonstrate some political point. And if they lived, they’d be back, baby! And if they died, well then, at least they went out on a high and with a “bang”! And even if their point was wrong or misguided, we’d all remember it forever and ever, for as long as we lived. And for this reason, I believe that this will end up being the future of American politics: Add reality show obnoxiousity, the attention-grabbing and dangerous stunts from things like Jackass, the angry polemics of blowhard pundits on TV, and combine that with the ever-increasing short attention-spans and jaded need for ever greater and more extremely ramped-up risks and stunts necessary to grab our citizen’s over-stimulated senses, and where is the logical conclusion for all of this ever-increasing intensity-demanding desire stuff’s trajectory? Why, it’s stuff like these “political stunts” I have outlined above, don’t you think? They’d just have to find a way to make them a little bit more survivable, and we’ll see stuff like this up the road a bit, I’m sure!

Telemarketers

I am on the “Do Not Call” List, so I’m not supposed to get calls from telemarketers. But does that stop them? No siree, it does not! But I suppose persistence is a virtue, eh? And it just shows that spirit of “go get ‘em”-osity that they are willing to jump any hurdle, climb any wall, knock on any door, and surmount any obstacle just to get that highly-sought-after opportunity to irritate and annoy us all at home. And frankly, who wouldn’t want to do that? (Is there a super-villain yet called: “Harassing Phone Call Man”, or: “The Tenacious Telemarketer”, or perhaps even: “Telephone Turpitude Dude”? I call dibs on this idea if there isn’t one yet. He could have a telephone headset hanging on his head, and he could have an old-style rotary phone dial on his chest, and a numerical keypad on his back; plus, he’d speak through some megaphone-style device over his mouth so he’d sound like those nasaly-static-y operators from a bygone era.)

I thought that joining the “Do Not Call” List would end the annoying harassment of such telephone calls at infuriatingly inopportune moments, and it did so for a short time; however, there appear to be ways around this telephone firewall, and everyone seems to be making use of them. For instance, if you are a charity, you’re allowed to nag people on the phone every day if you so choose, even if people beg you not to. Also, you’re allowed to call people with surveys, even if they don’t want to take part in them. And additionally, there is the tactic of assuming that since there are exemptions to this phone-call prohibition, that means everyone will be so harangued with infuriating telephone calls that they won’t notice if all the purportedly banned telemarketers just started calling again; and so they do: they do!

I heard there was some large fine levied upon any telemarketer who was so diabolical as to call a phone number they knew to be on the “Do Not Call” List, but apparently, if there ever was one, they’ve decided against implementing or enforcing it whatsoever. So now these nefarious reprobates have deduced that they can nag us all they like again, and there’s not much we can do about it. This became clear to me when I was being hounded by jerks from some shyster investment company, and I asked them to take me off their list, and they just kept calling anyway. So then I started just picking up the phone and hanging up. But then they would just call me back endlessly until I picked up the phone and then they would hang up on me. Ah: sweet revenge for them upon someone who has the temerity to want to be left alone and have his privacy and rights afforded by the “Do Not Call” List honored. Screw people like me, man! (But you’ve got to love that go-getter spirit of revenge: it’s just admirable that young people today have such an exemplary work ethic: that’s the kind of tenacity we need in our young professionals if America is going to lead the global economic recovery: eh, what?)

I’m getting more and more telemarketing calls nowadays too. It’s almost like the spam of telephones, it’s getting to that ridiculous of a level. And most of them these days are calling from a number listed in caller ID as: “Private Name, Private Number”. This should never be allowed for a telemarketer, and anyone who is caught doing it should be sent to a “black site” and, um, subjected to “enhanced interrogation techniques”! (I will happily volunteer as inquisitor in chief.) It’s getting so bad that I’m starting to feel like we should have a new law passed that permits telemarketing so long as we at home get a special button on our telephones that when pressed sends a painful electrical shock to the handset of the calling telemarketer (and the phone won’t work if it’s disabled, like with the breathalyzer on the car of a multiple DWI offender), and if they annoy us, we both know that we can inflict pain upon them. It’s the only way it’s fair. I have had to turn my ringer off, it’s so extreme some days. Surely this is not meant to be permissible under a Democratic administration, is it? I thought they wanted to help protect consumers and innocent civilians from the odious wrath of these toxic telephone tormentors! (Or maybe these iniquitous tyrants from telemarketing harassment firms donate lots of campaign cash to politicians’ election campaign funds? Doing so appears to help large donors get away with most anything, as well as becoming flush with taxpayer money and federal loan guarantees, so perhaps this is what’s been going on here? {You never know!})

Superman’s Superman Suit

Supposedly, Superman’s superhero costume is made from his childhood blanket. I guess it’s a good thing he came from another planet, then. Otherwise he might have a costume covered with Yodas, or Powerpuff Girls, or sports team logos, etc. Then everybody would laugh at him whenever he showed up! Oh, but I guess that would give him the perfect excuse to beat villains up, huh? (They were being abusive and bullying him about his clothes!) Plus, if they’re laughing really hard, it might make the villains easier to defeat in a fight! So then maybe Superman should have his costume made out of contemporary children’s blanket materials! It just might give him an “edge”! (I wonder if Superman made his Superman costume out of his childhood blanket because it was his security blanket, and he just didn’t feel secure or indeed “Super” without it? Could this be what Superman talks about with his Superanalyst? Or is that “Superpsychiatrist”? {After all, Superman lives in Metropolis, and everybody but everybody has a psychiatrist in Metropolis: for Metropolis is modeled after New York, and there’s just nothing that says “New York” like everybody having a psychiatrist! It’s true! They even considered replacing that “I Heart NY” slogan with “I Psychiatrist NY”, but they couldn’t think of a cogent logo graphic to convincingly denote “Psychiatrist”! But maybe it could be a little pad and pen on a couch: that might get the idea across, huh?} Yes, it’s Superpsychiatrist: mental health prefessional to the superheroes and part of the Justice League’s HMO of managed care providers! And does Superpsychiatrist have a Superman-style logo on his lab coat that says: “S, M.D., Ph.D., Psy.D.”? After all, if he’s a “super-psychiatrist”, shouldn’t he have lots and lots of degrees and degree-representative abbreviation letters on his lab coat/super suit? {The super-answer to this super-question is, undoubtedly: “Yes”!} But he shouldn’t make his lab coat/super suit out of his childhood blanket, because that might tend to undercut his gravitas somewhat.)

The Greatest Threat to Superheroes (Nowadays)

Lawyers and lawsuit abuse: this is the greatest threat to superheroes! I’m surprised nobody has made a movie about this yet. (Maybe someone has, and I missed it?) These days, everybody always sues everybody else over frivolous claims, like criminals sue people who fight back, police who arrest them for violent offenses, etc. Surely superheroes would be the perfect mark for this type of nefarious strategy!

In The Dark Night, the Joker offers to get rid of “The Bat-Man” by killing him. All he’d really have to do these days would be to show up all bruised and bloodied and say The Bat-Man bullied him and beat him up and violated his civil rights just because he’s a dangerous violent criminal (like in Dirty Harry: a surprisingly prescient movie indeed!). And we all know that these days it’s not permitted to give violent felons a taste of their own medicine: only they are allowed to abuse us; reversing that and fighting back is cheating and illegal bullying and as such is a crime against humanity!

So while he used to keep America safe for good people, these days Superman would probably get sued by burglars and muggers and rapists and other fiends and ne’er-do-wells for pain and suffering, as well as emotional distress. In fact, these days, criminals would probably go through the motions of perpetrating fake crimes just so the superheroes would show up and beat them up, and then they could sue them for millions. This strategy would work especially well against Batman, since Bruce Wayne is so über-wealthy. And when he continued to be able to afford to pay out all of these damages to criminals he’d roughed-up, it would become crystal clear to everyone who he was, because after all, who else could possibly afford to pay damages award after damages award, time after time, on top of hiring all those fancy-schmacy lawyers, except for billionaire philanthropist (and bully of bad-guys) Bruce Wayne?

Perhaps today the most feared super-villain of all would be: “The Shyster Lawyer”! (Or maybe: “The Judge” {He wears one of those British barrister wigs and black robes, and he fights with a gavel in each hand, hammering his opponents with blows from the “gavel of greedy jurisprudence” and “the mallet of monetary malice”.}, or a team of super-extortionists called “The Damages”.)

CNN: Secrets of the Belfast Project Promo Ad

CNN has an ad running for their show World’s Untold Stories sensationalizing a report they’re broadcasting about some secret Irish tapes detailing the past struggles there. They say in this promo for the show that revealing these tapes publicly “threatens the peace process” and may place many lives at risk. Well, if it could harm people, then CNN has shown they simply can’t wait to tell that story! Who cares if lives are at risk: this is news! (Plus, if they got everybody fighting and killing each other again, that would be even bigger news! Then they could proudly claim that CNN not only reports, but also creates, the news!)

To be fair, they’re hardly the only ones to do reckless and irresponsible stuff like this, sensationalizing volatile stories in such a way as to put many lives at risk (potentially), but they really ought to know better than to try to ramp up ill-will and hostilities through their reporting. The way they’re advertising this story appears as though they are attempting to incite riots and reignite hostilities in Ireland: Shame on them, seriously! If you must tell the story, how about doing it in a more respectful and dignified, low-key manner, so as not to derail the peace process? Wouldn’t that be more restrained and responsible? (Jerks.)

Look, CNN, I know you’re desperate for ratings and everything, but if a news story could cause violence, get people killed, etc., maybe you shouldn’t show it. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I exposed some long-buried secret that caused bloodshed on a large scale and derailed a long-negotiated peace process, renewing barely quelled hatred and causing a resurgence in hostilities and retribution. But then again, I don’t work for CNN. Maybe that’s why they’re the “most trusted name in news”: they never hesitate to tell the stories that can get people killed! And if you can’t trust someone like that, then really, who can you trust?

Here’s the reprehensible report on the sensationalized story:

http://cnnpressroom.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/25/worlds-untold-stories-secrets-of-the-belfast-project/

Bloomberg’s Big Beverage Ban

Mayor Bloomberg, God’s gift to New York City, has developed interdiction insanity, apparently. Not satisfied with placing prohibitions upon salt, trans-fats, cigarette smoking and fun, now he’s placed a prospective prohibition on outrageously enormous sodas, the number one threat to humanity! (I believe this ban applies only to the sodas sold in cups, so I would suggest a work-around to skirt the law temporarily: backpack super-sized sodas! They are a huge pouch containing ten gallons of the sugariest, syrupiest, ultra-caffeinated soda imaginable, designed with shoulder straps to be worn on the back like a backpack {because our kids are too weak and out-of-shape to hold them up any other way anyway: Bloomberg has simply helped create an even larger beverage container for fattening drinks that was needed anyway, and like necessity, Mayor Bloomberg, as always, is himself the Mother of Invention! Thanks, Bloomie!}, and with a long, flexible straw draped across the shoulder and running into the mouth so that thirsty tykes can slurp on it all day long to simultaneously satiate their sugar fix and thirst for sweetness, as well as their ravenous hunger for rebellion against ridiculous rules and regulations.)

Well, we can’t just sit back and take it, can we? Bloomie’s trying to change the “Land of the Free” into the “Terrain of the Tyranny of Dumbass Dictates”. So we have a sacred duty to foil this fanatical panty-waist and derail his dastardly decrees! So to achieve this end, I have an idea…

Okay, so really big sodas are illegal in the “Land of the Free”, eh? (Doesn’t that name: the “Land of the Free”, start sounding more and more ludicrous each and every day, with more and more ridiculously repressive prohibitions placed upon more and more benign things all the time? Unbelievable! We have a Constitutionally-protected right to “the pursuit of happiness”: what if the only manner in which I’m able to pursue happiness is through the ingestion of massive quantities of sugary sodas from one immeasurably large container of super-size? Why, Bloomberg is violating my Constitutional rights! That cad! The cur!) So then why not make a really small “mega-shot” of soda syrup, containing all the sugar, carbs, sweeteners, artificial ingredients, caffeine, etc., as the now-illegal super-sized soda? Why, then kids could get all that they craved in a small package, and they could ingest it all in one gulp, and they wouldn’t even have to lug that enormous cup around all day, which means they’d be getting even less exercise, so they’ll actually get even fatter! (I mean, assuming that Mayor Busybody will immediately make my backpack beverage container illegal upon hearing about it.)

Oh, but you know what? I think someone may have already started making this super-shot of sugar and sin: I believe it’s called “Mio”. Maybe Bullyberg had better ban that, too. Quick, Bloomer, ban it before it’s too late!

Now, full disclosure, I myself do not drink sodas, nor have I ever bought or even understood the desirability of the “super-sized” beverages. I simply can’t understand why anyone would even want that much soda in one cup (although many people seem to understand only too well, since everyone and their brother always seems to have one in their grubby little {actually, large} mitts. {Although them now being against the law makes them seem cool and edgy, so now I want one for the first time!}). But that’s not the point! Bloomberg is simply trying to deprive us of our freedom while at the same time trying to deprive the underprivileged in a shameless act of discrimination against the poor, and I think it’s unconscionable!

What’s that I say: Bloomberg is discriminating against poor people? How’s that? Well, it’s like this: In outlawing the large beverage cup, he’s merely making it impossible for people to get the requisite amount of soda affordably, for if you wanted the same amount, you could simply buy two large cups of soda, right? So it’s not the amount of soda he’s regulating, but merely the amount one must pay for this amount of soda. And by restricting the larger size, he’s simply making it so that only rich people can afford to get the beverage amount they want, while all poor and underprivileged folks must suffer from their thirst in poverty. Oh, but Big Bully Brother Bloomberg is mega-wealthy, so he can afford to buy two large sodas, even in a movie theater, where they cost thousands of dollars per ounce! So I suppose now he’s going to traipse all over the city, with a large soda cup in each hand, slurping out of both of them at once, teasing the riff-raff and rubbing it in that while they can no-longer afford the beverage amount of their desire, he most certainly still can (for his cup runneth over!): the boor!

Oh, but hey: I have just had a brain-wave for a fund-raising technique for Bloomberg to bankroll his future political aims: Mayor Bloomberg should simply set up a dunking booth in Times Square where he sits over a tank filled with soda, and with the tank shaped and painted to look like a super-sized “Big Gulp”, and then charge everyone $20 per ball to throw to try to make him fall in! After this tyrannical abuse of power, I’m sure everyone will be thirsting for revenge! (Get it? “Thirsting”? Because he’s limiting their fluid intake with this new law? Ha ha! Oh, sorry…)

And I’m not just down on poor Mr. Bloomberg: I hate anyone who passes (or attempts to pass) edicts of prohibition on everyday items, curtailing our freedoms more and more each day. These people are the enemies of freedom and fun, and I think they should be thrown in prison for unconstitutionally violating our civil rights. (No kidding.) They’re abusing the power we grant them when they do stupid excrement like this, and they need to be immediately and vociferously criticized when they do such intrusive, petty things that limit our personal freedom and enjoyment of life. Seriously: screw them! (You know the expression: “Life sucks, and then you die?” Well, apparently that sounded far too enjoyable to people like Bloomberg, so he’s trying to change it to the more acceptable: “Life is interminably nauseating with the irritating and intrusive bullsh*t of meddling government douche-bags, and then fortunately you die, allowing for sweet escape from the hell-on-Earth they have subjected you to.” {But that’s so much catchier anyway, don’t you think?})

It’s funny, too, because the ones who are constantly whittling away at our freedoms in this regard nowadays are liberals. I thought liberals were supposed to be liberal, meaning: “favorable to or respectful of individual rights and freedoms / favoring maximum individual liberty” (!): Ha! What a laugh! (That’s the opposite of what liberals are like nowadays! Now they’re every bit as meddling and repressive as conservatives are! It’s hilarious, although to me it’s a joke that’s in very poor taste {although it’s still funny, in an absurdist, asinine and Kafkaesque way}!) But these guys are nothing more than petty, tyrannical buzzkills and traitors against freedom and fun. Oh, and they’re always, bar none, hypocrites to the core, doing the very things they prohibit we the people from doing. Oh, but they get a pass (if they’re liberals or Democrats) from the news media, who simply love oppression so long as it comes from the left. (The news people appropriately bash conservatives and Republicans for such intrusive invasions of privacy and curtailings of personal liberties, but why not attack the left for the same behavior? Hypocrisy addiction? Isn’t there some treatment facility for such disorders? {If so, most of them would have to go to rehab repeatedly!}) And that makes them every bit as guilty in my book as the douche-bag lawmakers who chip away at our freedoms every day (on both the right and the left). What ninnies! Remember the expression: “The road to hell is paved with good intentions”? This is exactly what this expression is referring to: stupid crap like these meddling & oppressive nanny-state laws. These people are the road commission and construction firm for the “Highway to Hell”. (And they should be very ashamed of themselves indeed! Jerks.)

(Warning: Screed Alert! {Oh, sorry: should I have put this at the beginning? Oh well, it’s too late to move it now!})