Will Sanity Be Restored? Not if WE can help it…

Well, it’s not a cartoon, but damn, it’s been so long since I posted anything, I just had to post SOMETHING. First of all, my bronchitis is “mostly” gone. I feel better but my strength isn’t up completely back to where it should be. It will be by the end of the week. Thanks to my well-wishers who expressed good wishes. We won’t mention what I wish for those who wished the opposite

I DID get to the Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert Rally to Restore Sanity/Fear on Saturday. Wish I’d done more to publicize it, although the boys certainly did not need MY publicity. The subway (errrr Metro–how gay is that? –Samantha Bee) was incredible. There were lines 20-30 minutes long to buy tickets and then olive oil was spread on the riders to get them all squeezed into the cars. When the doors finally opened at L’Enfant Plaza, it was like projectile vomit as the trains disgorged their charges.

By the time I actually made the rally location–and I admit I was moving slowly due to my energy levels–you literally could not get two blocks from the mall before foot traffic slowed to a shuffle-along. The DC police had wisely shut down several streets. My own uninformed crowd guesstimates said there was at least 150k people there and possibly as high as 300k. I think the TOTAL number of people who came to the Rally was close to the latter, but because of the difficulty getting within site and sound of the stage–and there were video feeds with huge sound systems to relay the proceedings to the further away, BUT THERE WERE THAT MANY PEOPLE THERE–that the back of the crowd was very fluid with people arriving, staying for a while, and then leaving to get a better view ON THE INTERNET. In fact, I couldn’t stay to the end because I couldn’t find a good place to both see and hear what was going on. The CBSNews paid for crowd count said 215,000. That’s a reasonable number for the amount of people who were there at any single moment in time.

It was odd to see how the news media handled it. Although pre-rally shows began at 10 am, and some people had been there since the night before, I could not find any crowd estimates on the cable news stations. It was as if nothing was going to happen. Contrast that with the ballyhoo that characterized Glenn Beck’s revival meetin’. By Sunday, the coverage rapidly evaporated after 6 am–yesterday’s news. DId they get wind of what the main point of the Rally was? That the media, fanning the flames of partisanship, is one of the major contributors to the chasm that is seen between political viewpoints today? As people, we work together everyday despite differences–Jon Stewart likened it to merging into the lanes of a tunnel–a very apt simile for someone in the NY/NJ area. Yet in politics, there is this perception of near civil war, at least the way the news media provides soapboxes to the MOST extreme elements.

Some of my progressive friends have opined that Jon and Stephen STILL missed the point–after all, the most extreme elements are all ON THE RIGHT. That may be so. But the point of the rally wasn’t to point fingers at THEM. It was to point fingers at the people on the sidelines who are busily asking both sides if they need more gasoline to put out the fire. They are no longer informing us. They’re like the reporter in Ace in the Hole/The Big Carnival who prevented the rescue of the man trapped in a cave to prolong the news story. In the movie, the trapped guy died. But now, we’re the people in the cave. Will we have a release like the Chileans? Or do we go down in the interests of real journalism?

Thanks Jon and Stephen. It was a good rally.

And Another Thing–Why Are All These Books About Jews Anyway?

Conservapedia–the online encyclopedia that shows you the RIGHT way to think about things!–has come up with a new project: the translation of a CONSERVATIVE Holy Bible! Even though conservative preachers have been going great guns with that old perennial, the King James translation, Conservapedia has decided that it is much too liberal. After all, those Jacobeans who hung severed heads of criminals on prison gates were just too bleeding heart (bleeding heads don’t count). Convinced that not only have certain passages been mistranslated, but that the original texts contained politically correct interpolations, they have asked readers to help in retranslating the Bible to illustrate conservative principles. After all, it shouldn’t take too long–there’s only about 8000 verses, that could take one person only a year–think how fast it could be done with lots of people. They will also be editing the text to weed out suspicious passages, like “Father, forgive them…” Forget about–give away all your goods and follow me–obviously a later interpolation. The New Testament will probably get cut to about a page and a half but you can be sure we’re gonna get that old story about the “Eye of the Needle” gate to show that rich people really CAN get into heaven.
Now granted some recent translations have taken pains to introduce PC language–but nobody likes these translations anyway–up until the late 20th century, translators took pains to produce translations of greater and greater literal accuracy. Words change over a couple of thousand years–some Biblical vocabulary has shifted meaning and there are other words that nobody knows WTF they meant in the first place! So every translation and retranslation was intent on correcting errors made by the LAST translators because nobody speaks ancient Greek and ancient Hebrew anymore. There are entire SCHOOLS devoted to Biblical criticism–that’s right, I mean YOU, Tübingen! So where TF do these guys come off thinking they can figure out what the Bible really means and WTF is really in it? One of their justifications is “Well, Thomas Jefferson did the same thing and everyone knows what kind of bleeding heart liberal HE was.” Oooo, oooo, oooo, oooo, oooo! Got me THERE! Well, Thomas Jefferson only did that with the Gospels and he wasn’t attempting to thrust it down anyone’s throats, but was just doing it for his own intellectual curiosity, not a political screed. But I forgot–the editors of Conservapedia have opinions, not intellectual curiosity.
NONETHELESS, in a spirit of co-operation, We have decided to lend Conservapedia a hand and deliver our own conservative version of a short passage. Conservapedia is free to include this passage (as long as they footnote an attribution to Greg Uchrin, Intravenous Caffeine LOL):

The Eight Beatitudes

And Jesus said:
“Blessed are the poor in mental capacity, for they shall cast votes…
“Blessed are the mean, for they shall possess everything…
“Blessed are they who mourn, for the inheritance tax shall be abolished…
“Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for justice, for theirs is the hand on the switch…
“Blessed are the merciless interrogators, for they shall be called patriots and let off scot free…
“Blessed are the pure of blood, for they shall be called white folks…
“Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they shall shoot six…
“Blessed are those who reap incredible profits from astute political contributions, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven.”

(For additional info, see Conservatizing the Bible. And check out TheColbertReport for instructions on how YOU can help add Stephen Colbert to the Conservative Bible )

We Know You’re Superman, Jimmy–We Heard It On Twitter!

Well, it’s became an even worse week for celebrities. Karl Malden passed away the other day, my GOD, the man was 97, that means back when he was doing all those American Express commercials, he was in his vigorous 70s! For some people, death is God’s way of telling you to take a vacation. And with all these deaths going on, Richard Wilkins of Australia’s Channel Nine, announced that Jeff Goldblum had also died. He’d read it on Twitter and as we all know, what you read on Twitter you can take to the bank. Well, it seems as if rumors of Jeff Goldblum’s demise were somewhat premature–as we found out on the Colbert Report where Jeff Goldblum delivered a eulogy for…Jeff Goldblum.
Which brings up a question–are we supposed to treat Twitter as a reliable news source? Looks like CNN, MSNBC and Fox News are doing it here in the States. After all, would anyone tweet something that wasn’t true? The problem is, as newspaper editors and publishers have been finding out, the 24 hour news cycle is soooooooo last century. With the advent of blogs, we shifted to a 1440 MINUTE news cycle and now with Twitter, an 86,400 SECOND news cycle. Who will be the first to tweet the findings of Michael Jackson’s autopsy? How fast will it spread over cyberspace? Will it be the real news, or will someone be tweeting a hoax?
The fact is, Twitter is not an information spreading technology, it’s a rumor spreading technology. Yes, it can be used to spread the news of something important like the Iranian uprising. But even there, we only got half the story–the half that the people who had access to Twitter wanted us to have. It’s accepted knowledge that the election results were fraudulent, but according to ABC/Washington Post polls taken the week before the election, there was every chance that the reported results, despite some irregularities, did indeed reflect the vote of the country. But we chose to believe the faction that claimed fraud–partially because we wanted to believe them and partially because of the barrage of news being tweeted at us. This is not to say that my sympathies do not lie with the Iranian people, but it’s important for us to realize that Twitter is not a news source. It can spread news, but it can also be used to spread rumor, propaganda and disinformation. Just ask Jeff Goldblum
Just to clear things up, no, people who read comics are NOT halfwits–if I thought they were, I wouldn’t be DRAWING them–but I just couldn’t resist the play on words with Fraction Comics.

ColBERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT!

Now I watch other brilliant commentators on our nation. I watch The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. I like Stephen…he’s an up-and-coming young man, to whom I wish all the success in the world. But what gets me is that every once in a while, Stephen and his writers look like they’re reading me–AND NOT SENDING ME A CHECK! It happened many times during HAIL DUBYUS! but I overlooked it–after all, he is young. Great minds do think alike and what occurred to me could have easily occurred to him or his writers. And the young are wont to do brash and foolish things. But imagine the look on my face when I saw last night’s Colbert Report and saw the juxtaposition of these two clips which followed back to back on each other, the first about Congressmen twittering during the Obama speech the other night, and the second about adopting the “Swedish” economic plan and going Viking:

 

Now look at yesterday’s cartoon about congressmen twittering:

and this one from January 27, just one month ago,where I suggest to the ICELANDIC Nation that they take up a-Viking Again to solve their economic woes!

Nation… it is true that great minds think alike. And Stephen has a mind that is almost as sharp and quick as my own. But this is beyond coincidence. I own the copyright on Vikings! Stephen, if you’re going to use my material, you should PAY for it. Stephen Colbert, you have earned yourself a wag of my finger! YOU HEAR THAT COLBERT–I WANT YOU TO USE THAT DONATION BOX OVER ON THE RIGHT. Yeah, that one.———–> Until then, you’re on notice, mister! And that’s the word

ABOUT MEH

Cartoons and text by Greg Uchrin (aka Gregorius alexandrinus), with the able assistance of Fred and Bert Squirrel, with special appearances by George Dymme. Published once a week on Mondays.

And check out my DeviantArt gallery:

GregoriusU @ Deviant Art

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