Further to my earlier moan about the fuckwits that previously owned my flat and their inability to do anything right, the cooker hood just fell off the wall. Fuck, shit, bollocks. It appears that they attempted to mount it by drilling a hole into some sort of filler rather than brick. Argh. Still, given that it only ever blew air into the MDF floor of the cupboards mounted above (muppets), and so served us as a glorified lamp, it's no great loss.
Courtesy of Wonkette, please enjoy the "World's Dumbest Website": Hillary Clinton Supporters For John McCain (dot com). Even ignoring the terrible URL (hcsfjm to you too) and the web design, which is held back from Internet '96 status only by the lack of a little picture of a stick man digging, it's horrible. And stupid. Really, really, really stupid, in fact. Check the comments.
First, the SCREAMING CAPITALS
I'M JUST CONFUSED HOW THE HELL THESE WHITEYS ARE VOTING FOR THIS ANTI AMERICAN HUSSAIN OSAMA ON THE TOP OF THAT WHO HAS NO RESUME WHAT SO EVER TO BECOME THE PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES, THE ONLY THING HE HAS IS SCRIPTED SPEECH AND THE SCARY ANTI AMERICAN CORRUPTED FRIENDS . I WOULD NEVER VOTE FOR THIS TERRORIST NO MATTER WHO IS IN THE TICKET, I'M VOTING FOR JOHN MCCAIN WE CAN TRUST HIM WITH OUR EYES CLOSED NO MATTER WHO IS HIS FRIENDS ARE NOT HUSSAIN OSAMA AND HIS WIFE
and the CPTLIZD TXT SPK FROM D KIDZ:
HILLARY WUZ CHEATED Y DINT THEY COUNT TEH VOTEZ FROM MI AND FL THAT IS NOT OK 2 DISSENFRANCHIZE VOTERZ LIKE THAT OBAMA IS A MUSLIM DUSNT THAT SCARE NEONE A MUSLM AND PROBLY HAZ TIES 2 TERRORUISTS IN TEH MIDDLE EAST. HIS MIDDLE NAME IS HUSSEIN LIKE SADDAM PPL! HILLARY 4EVER I HOPE SHE RUNS AS AN IND BUT IF NOT I AM VOTING 4 MCCAN.
To be fair, even the hcsfjm editor complained about the legibility of that guy. But then there's the DRUGS!
I'm a small town pizza maker here in Weed, CA.
I've dropped out of the campaign for Hillary with pizza in hand, despondent over the loss of our party to the extreemists of obama.
beside,s he did DRUGS!
We don't need him in the whitehouse, it will be like that mayor from DC Maryan Berry.
Love the idea of "dropping out with pizza in hand", though. Some have done exhaustive research:
I can't stand Obama. If anyone cared to look up his full name on his website, his middle name is Hussein. Who the hell wants a Hussein in as our president. This just goes to prove that our electoral system is so far rigged, it's not funny.
Others have resorted to theology:
I have always said Obama was probably the anti-christ so everyone needs to BE WARE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
OK, I'm ware. What next? Political theory:
Obama equals socialism pushing Karl Marx agenda - take from those who can and give to those in need
Giving to people in need? Heresy. This guy invokes the name of Louis, er, Ferrykahn:
I called a local radio program here called "take a stand" 570 in asheville nc. I called to say why I wasnt voting for Obama. I prefaced by saying that I voted for clinton, gore and kerry, but would not vote for obama because he was a marxist and hung out with ferrykahn.
And then possibly the only time you'll ever read the sentence:
WHERE IS RALPH NADER WHEN WE NEED HIM???
It's mindboggling. Also check out this video, much beloved of the hcsfjm crowd, which includes the damning indictment "With America at war with Islamic terrorism, can we elect a man with not one, not two, but three Islamic names?". At least it doesn't add LIKE SADDAM PPL, I suppose.
Countryaboveself.com may well have become my new favourite website. Partly because it proves that Poe's Law holds for extreme political opinions as well as extreme religious ones (is it real, or a joke set up by some Wonkette readers with a lot of spare time?), partly because its readers apparently consider Alberto ("I don't recall") Gonzales the greatest American patriot, but largely because of its voting policy.
You see, anyone can nominate a patriot or traitor, casting a vote that affects the rankings on the front page. Very democratic. Except that anyone who disagrees with the prevailing opinion is banned from voting - as shown in this list. So, democrats are prevented from voting - it's a bit like Florida.
Of course, one might very well point out that this kind of policy goes against the great American ideal of free speech. The irony is evidently lost on the site's creators, though, as shown by a quote from Winston Churchill displayed proudly further down the page:
Everyone is in favor of free speech. Hardly a day passes without its being extolled, but some people's idea of it is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone says anything back, that is an outrage.
Quite so. Also, I'd love to know why one user was banned for nominating "truck nut again truck nut" as a traitor. Or, indeed, why they made this nomination in the first place.
Some people like to get in a strop about foreign call centres. These people are idiots. Proof, courtesy of the two calls we had to make this morning:
1) Helen calls bank to advise them that she'll be using her credit card in Russia. Phones UK-based call centre, and explains that she'll be in Russia. Where specifically? Moscow, then Saint Petersburg. Yes, Saint Petersburg. Where? Russia. Yes, they're both in Russia. Moscow and Saint Petersburg are both cities in Russia - just as she'd explained at the outset. Add in the fact that she's flying via Milan (bonus fact: Milan is not in Russia) and the whole geography lesson takes the best part of 15 minutes.
2) I call insurance company to wrangle over the details of our car insurance renewal. I phone call center based half a world away. Five minutes later, and it's all sorted out. No confusion, nothing lost in translation, no massive holes in the general knowledge of the lady answering the phone. And £15 cheaper each month. Excellent.
There's much joy to be had from the inanities posted to the BBC's Have Your Say website, but the wonders of user-submitted content go further. Amazon's reader reviews are particularly fine and, if you pick the right book, show up some disturbing truths about the commenters' views on society.
Take, for example, one Clancy-esque thriller about terrorism and the middle east. First, there's inadvertent social and media commentary:
"To me, if the bad guys don't get smacked down in the end, it's not a happy ending … I'm going to wait for [author] to get out of his contract before I try him again; when he finally has the time to write something imaginative and with a little more meat. Until then, though, I'll be sticking with Fox News."
then those with an inability to distinguish between neocon fantasy and reality:
"Spending time in [author's] books makes me want to believe that we actually have people like these out there doing the dirty work that, I suspect, must be done in a dangerous world."
"While the names are changed to protect the "innocent", so much of this book is a timely analysis of current events and a realistic approach to dealing with them."
"[author]'s bread and butter has always been delving deep into the intricacies Middle East politics and [title] excels in that department. Not only was the story and action top notch but it was a real education into the workings of the Iranian government."
.. and then dozens that are just terrifying:
"This is not a book for the squeamish. It is a gritty portrayal of the real world of today's War on Terror and how it is fought in the trenches. It asks and answers the key confounding questions of what is torture and does it work. "
"[protagonist], you see, is an real American. He recognizes that the United States is inherently good and that there are truly evil people in the world. … Anyone who cares about the United States will wish that [protagonist] was real … [he] doesn't care about the foolish laws that keep him from protecting the nation."
"How timely this book is. With liberal democrats insistent on protecting insurgents at Gitmo, undermining CIA, and dismantling protocols that will enable us to fight a non-uniformed, secret, undercover army, this book will give them a dose of reality."
Yikes.