Monday, April 27, 2009

Pork Double Good Fortune

Swine flu! Gesundheit.

Some pandemic this is turning out to be. Yes, of course, people are suffering from a very bad head cold, and some people probably have pneumonia by now. There has been a smattering of cases worldwide, but this is no international health crisis. The reality seems to be that people are genuinely shocked by a warm weather flu. Does that justify the hyperbole, histrionics, and hollering of pandemic! in a crowded world. Pandemic? Because some poor pig farmer who lives in pigshit caught and transmitted the pork flu? Quelle surprise?


Memo to myself: propose an end to human-livestock cohabitation. (This may put the kibosh on Iowa's recent bill to legalize marriage between one redneck and one farm animal. Polygamy is an issue, I suppose.)


We should busy ourselves finding a more sinister name for the bug-du-jour, because swine flu frankly sounds delicious; or it sounds like we're insulting the flu, and/or the pig. Poor pigs. The pig cull will certainly be greater than the human moribidity. And, anyway, a saucy acronym would inspire dread among the dubious. How about B.A.C.O.N.? Buy Another Case of Nyquil.

Israel is actively renaming the swine flu, pork being off the Jew's hospital menu. G.O.Y.: Gentile Originated sYndrome.


The facts: The swine flu has a current body count of, approximately, 50 people. How does that constitute a pandemic? It's about the same as the annual winter flu cull in New York City. (Or Mexico City.)

I'll tell you how a few sick people constitutes a pandemic. Because it's Mexico. This oinking flu is piggybacking on Mexican drug war hysteria. Mexico looks more than ever like a failed state.

And you might argue that this is a good time to reconsider, or rescind NAFTA. You would be right. But for the wrong reasons.


This crisis has demonstrated that the US needs to embrace Mexico as if it were part of the US. We need to behave as if there were no border at all because, in practice, there isn't one. If Mexico is a failing state, this medical situation gives us an opportunity to shore up Mexican society. We must synchronize our medical and social welfare delivery systems. Health and Human Services are primary in restoring civil order and confidence in society. And this can only help in the war against Mexican drug lords.


The question is: How can we possibly contain the spread of infection between US and Mexico if we can't document every potential carrier who enters the US? The US-Mexico border is more porous than the proverbial Papal condom.

Mexico may be sending us flu, but we are sending them guns. Both are primary health issues. If 50 deaths constitutes an epidemic, then gun violence is at an epidemic level in both the US and Mexico. The CDC is sending vaccine. Where is the NRA? The ATFE? The DOJ? What are they sending?


Ultimately, no one prays harder for a pandemic than I. Humanity needs a good culling. Look around you. (We could start with the people who named this pandemic.) But there is real danger in wild overreaction to this rather minor outbreak. Perhaps we will be less inclined to mount a serious, sustained response to the next, real(er) pandemic.

We were lucky this time.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Love Thine Scurvy Dogs

These days, speak fondly about pirates and you may get a lecture on copyright infringement. Or perhaps someone will mockingly call you the perfect model of a modern Major-General.

I mean to talk about real pirates. No eye makeup and Keith Richards impersonations. Just vicious, stinking, amoral terrors to legitimate international commerce. You know, like the people who conjured credit default swaps.

Anyway, there has never been a good time to be a pirate. The typical life of a pirate is nasty, brutish and short, which is a good thing because they rarely bathe. They sail for long periods with nothing to do but drink and sing songs about drinking, and perhaps enjoy social activities like knitting parasols from seaweed or doing the circle jerk.

Is it any wonder they are irritable? Have you ever had scurvy? Of course you haven't. I'll bet you get your RDA of Vitamin C from the fresh lime juice in your gimlet. Snob!

I digress.

The recent, spectacular failure of Somali pirates to capture the Maersk Alabama and its crew highlights the most pressing problem facing today's Pirate of the Somali Main: the US Navy. It is a colossal mismatch, and not in favor of the home team. Amazingly, inexplicably, Somali pirates are still actively hunting off the Horn of Africa. What have they got to lose?

The world is asking the right question: What opportunities are there for young Somalis other than piracy? Soldiering, the madrassa, destitution? Piracy means freedom and glory, potentially, as well as that pursuit of death thing. Live fast, die young and leave no corpse.

We know Somali pirates put to sea in small, fast boats, in teams of 3 or 4 young men who are lightly armed. They are at the mercy of the weather, dozens of miles out at sea, braving wretched conditions for days at a time while waiting for the chance to...WHAT?!? Harpoon and subdue a supertanker and its crew?


I don't understand that moment of decision, where the captain of a tiny pirate vessel spots the cruising city that is a modern container ship and says to his friends, "we can take 'em." Does anyone ask if he's insane? Or do they quietly agree that they can, in fact, take 'em?

Maybe they can take them. But not for long. Soon enough the world's navies will have squeezed their many warships into that narrow lane of water, protecting seaborne commerce to and from the Suez Canal. It will be curtains for the brave Somali pirates. They simply cannot compete with modern gunboats.

The East African Pirate will become extinct. This can only mean one thing: The Pirate is an endangered species, and must be protected!

And here's my plan to save them: Piratourism. The Pirate Safari. Piratespotting!

Here's what we know: The pirates have fast boats. But, we have faster boats. Our boats sneak in close so the piratourist can observe the pirates' normal behavior in his natural habitat. Then we withdraw at either maximum speed or silently depending on whether or not we have disturbed the pirates. We must understand the pirate ecosystem in order to protect it.

Friendly reminder: Pack a lunch. You can use it to negotiate your freedom in the event of engine trouble. This does not happen very, very often. Also, body armor is not compulsory as it doesn't float so well.

For the hearty adventurer who desires a bit more meat in his stew: We offer a glorious excursion around the Horn of Africa where you will enjoy nine days and eight nights of captivity, with or without torture, at sea and/or on land. Your subsequent ransom is built into the price of the vacation.

We can modify your vacation at any point to include the Stockholm Suite, ennabling you to actually become a pirate for as long as you'd like.

We put the host in hostage.

Somalia has much to gain by taxing Piratourism. The annual income will be enough to sustain schools and hospitals and a strong central government.

We must protect the precious resource that is today's pirate.

Would you prefer a world without pirates?

Thursday, April 16, 2009

It's the Balm

I deeply believe in the healing power of divorce. Sort of.

I believe in the 20-Minute Divorce. Example: When Lori's geriatric chihuahua shits on my pillow for the thousandth time, or when Lori just sits there laughing as our infant son urinates on my guitar (extinguishing the fire that Lori started), I declare DIVORCE.

It's very simple. I leave the room in an epic huff, pleading my tragic case against the miscreant, who is currently my wife, to, "Your Honor." The testimony is overwhelming and fluid and then immediately sanctimonious.

I begin to feel badly for having called her an asshole. I am an idiot. Again.

I confess this now because Texas is threatening to secede. Again. The last time was during the Civil War, when they decided that slavery had a bright future in Texas. Now they are claiming "taxation without representation," as if they'd forgotten about their 32 elected representatives in the House of Representatives and their 2 Senators.

The accusation refers to the Amerian Colonies' (18th Century) relationship with Imperial England in which the colonies paid taxes to a King on the other side of an ocean who refused to recognize basic rights, like a right to vote.

There are 12 Democrats elected to represent Texas in the US House of Representatives. If just one of them voted for the stimulus, Texas has representation.

And even if NONE of the Democrats voted for the stimulus, Texas still has representation. What about all the federal money Texas receives for education? For civil service? Police and fire fighters, hospitals and charities? And let's not forget the Gringo Federales who stalk the Mexican-American border protecting Texas from the Mexican Drug War.

Wait a minute, I'm not saying I don't want Texas to secede. I would like nothing more than to see George W. Bush's gated community become a neo-Alamo, where he'd heroically battle to the death with the Santa Anna's, I mean, um, the Mexican Drug Cartel's overwhelming number and firepower.

The new rallying cry: REMEMBER A NAMELESS SUBURB OF DALLAS! (It's Preston Hollow, thank you very much.)

Hooray.

And Lord knows we would only gain as a nation by jettisoning Texas' near-retarded mean IQ. We'd probably be smarter, on average, than Ecuador or Nigeria. I know how important that is for us.

The reality is, of course, that Texas would feel very badly after about 20 minutes; after calling us an asshole and storming out of the country, loudly pleading its airtight testimony to, "Your Honor."

And we'd probably feel badly for it, because we know that Texas is prone to certain behavior. And frankly we love it for that wackiness. We need Texas. And not just because it keeps the failed Mexican state at bay.

We need Texas because Texas helps us define ourselves. For instance, how would I know that I am no longer a Liberal, that I am now, in fact, a Socialist, if not for the reactionary fascist pig that is Texas.

VIVA TEXAS!

And this way we can avoid the nasty custody dispute over the panhandle. Paternity's a bitch.

Monday, April 13, 2009

Was considering what, specifically, drove Robyn Gibson to divorce The Mel.

Was it the various infidelities over the course of their 28 year marriage?

Or Melbert's anti-semitic tirades over french toast at brunch?

Okay, maybe the last straw was Maverick, the movie. But that was 15 years ago! Surely even that celluloid turd was forgiven, if not forgotten. And anyway, he's spent $750,000 on whores and tequila since Lethal Weapon 4.

Mel reports that the couple actually separated in "late August of 2006." Only three months before Congress was retaken by Democrats. Perhaps Mel went Passion of the Mad Max on the fam in anticipation of the coming Republican bloodletting. We know his penchant for the apocalyptic.

She just couldn't take the, "Two men enter, One man leaves," taunting any more. Me either. Remember the second half of Thunderdome? What were we thinking loving that movie?

Can you imagine spending 28 years with Mad Max? It would be like FREEDOM! everyday for the rest of your life.

Come to think of it, maybe that's why Mrs. Gibson finally chose divorce: Mel may not be a real person, he's an amalgam of his on-screen personas.

And on top of that he had Britney Spears to his Costa Rican home!

He can keep that house.

Sunday, April 12, 2009

A quick word on a so-called "crisis of brain drain in the banking sector."

Let them go.

It is a festering sore that is draining. They are pus.

These people refuse to live in a moral world where people play by the rules and succeed on merit. Not that we'll ever get to that place, but I think we can agree that we've had a sort-of shotgun referendum recently on what works long-term and what doesn't.

Will we really miss these people? Let them go. The Anti-Moses.

Some truly gifted, forward-thinking minds may be lost in this transition, as bankers run for Luxembourg and Monaco because they can't make a living wage on Wall Street.

Let them go.

In this exodus are the gangsters who shorted blue-chip companies for super-massive short-term gain, and perverted our imperfect and vulnerable capitalist system.

Oh what a horror, more talented teachers! Oh what horror, more social workers! More caregivers! OH THE HORROR!

Let them go.