Unraveling the Illusion of Meaning/part 1

In response to the question, What do you want to do in the future? a Japanese university student writes:
"I want to go to France, because French food wants to eat me."

And, needless to say, we'd all like to be there to watch as this culinary paradox unfolds.

Another writes, "I want the job of welfare, because I want to help a lame dog over a turnstile."

Hard, admittedly, to get a handle on this one. Can't really see it as a viable career option. Just not that many crippled dogs trying to fly over turnstiles. Not in my experience, anyway. Lame politicians maybe. Plenty of them around, mental cripples mostly, but it would take a true to the bone altruist, a self-effacing paragon of saintly virture, to even consider helping them.
Let alone voting for them.

CNN Headline: Two more die in Pakistan during cartoon riots.

So what, seriously, is up with the Muslims? Talk about taking the vapid, senseless, mindlessness of organized religion to its logical conclusion. These people make the Born Again Christian set actually start to look good. I mean, there has got to be better things to do than pray to Allah 17 times a day and, when you're not busy praying (for what, one wonders?) you hang around on the street waiting for the next deadly riot to get started. Do any of these people ever go indoors? Sure, it's the climate, living in the hot, dull desert all day. the brain begins to boil, the hollows of hopelessness begin to fill with the fervor of religious banality. And it's all the obvious things, as well, like no jobs, no education, no sex.
Especially no sex. If these young, Arabs were getting layed on a regular basis they'd be much less likely to be murdering each other in front of the local mosque. They wouldn't have to be trampelling their fellow Muslims to death in their enthusiasm to reach yet another holy shrine (how many holy shrines do these people really need?)

Hey, let's go! We can run over all these old Muslim men and women and get to the shrine first and throw stones at the Devil.
No, I'm not in the mood today.
Infidel!
Relax! I'm as devout a Muslim as you, and I'm willing to kill you to prove it.
Praise Allah!
It's just that I had sex last night. Great sex, in fact.
Out of wedlock? Sinner! Your thing will be chopped off in the public square. After which there will be a mandatory riot.
All I'm saying is that sex is a lot more fun than killing people in the name of God.
Really? Is that possible?

(Disclaimer: Just to calm the torrid emotions of any irate Muslims reading this - and what are the chances? it's more likely that aliens on another planet are reading my blog) - I am not anti-Muslim. I hate all religions equally.)

Let's move on.....

Bush & the Intricacies of Political Irony:

Recall the grim days of the Bush Dynasty? Those 'Compassionate Conservatives' who plunged the world into a thousand years of unremitting darkness.

So we have this President, little George Bush, and his coroprate gang of zombie goodfellows. They want to control the world (at least the world's oil supply), as well as turn the USA into a corporate-friendly-police state. So? Blatant money politics stole the election for little George in 2000. Fortunately, the dim-witted American people forgot about this almost instantly. They were too busy finding Jesus and exploring the outer limits of collective obesity while watching Reality tv. Bush was as bad as any of us who still read and occasionally think past the buzz of hysterical sound bites knew he was. His advisors knew it, too. Even George himself suspected it. Then 9-11 happened. Terrible, but also lucky. Maybe the sneaky little bastards in the so-called intelligence community knew about it in advance. Maybe the Saudis set the whole thing up. Maybe Dick Cheney had a vision. Handle this thing right and Halliburton could someday rule the world. Maybe Carl Rove had to blow a couple of Shieks. What of it? As every good military leader knows, a certain number of casualites is always acceptable for the greater good.
Salvage a Presidency and enhance the conservative Republican agenda in one memorable swoop. And it worked. Okay, a bogus war costing half a trillion dollars certainly helped. Legions of expert propagandaists playing the fear card at every opportunity didn't hurt, either. Across America, millions of Americans who have never had an original thought realized they were in danger. What if they attack the Malls? Jesus Saves. Bush got re-elected. Blame the right-wing Christians for that one. Now most of them are being devoutly screwed by his policies, but they still don't seem to care. Their reward, after all, is waiting in heaven.
So, fine. A brilliant political strategy that worked better than anyone could have expected. A totally fearful electorate. Will go along with almost anything. The corporations win, the environment loses, the American middle class slowly disappears. Most of them had no health care, anyway, so perhaps they're better off.
The way it goes. the world de-evolves. Religion rules the masses and the Bushs' pray the people never wake up and figure out what's really going on.

At least there is still irony to sustain us in the darkness. To whit:
After all this effort to create a paranoid nation, the Bush people are shocked and awed that most Americans are against them selling several major US ports to an Arab country. The fear thing worked, they won, and now they're pissed off about it.
Nice touch. Near-perfect dissconnect with their own bullshit.

As painful as it is, have to love it.