Long Overdue Post

I tried to think of a witty, pithy title, but I had nothin'. I'm halfway through grad school apps, took my econ final tonight, so I might be able to blog a bit more. Things are looking up!

I want to stop myself before I get too positive. That isn't why I created this blog. I created it as a cathartic way to get things off my chest and in the process hopefully teach someone a thing or too. I am sure I have failed in this latter respect, but I try. Before I start with anything political or truly significant, I want to point something out, something that never really hit me until recently.

Basically, I am Opposite Guy. I have never intended to be, it is not something that I purposefully created and nurtured. But it is true nonetheless. You're probably like "What the hell are you talking about?" Alright, I live in Fairfield County which is in the New York City metropolitan area. NYC is a little less than an hour away. My sis lives there and I go there a decent amount. I love it. I would love nothing more than to have a penthouse overlooking Central Park. That is, with all honesty, a dream of mine. Yet, with the kind of random exception of the Rangers, I dislike New York sports teams. Most of the people in my town and county, my friends, and my family, are all NY sports fans. I am not. Why? I don't really know, but if someone didn't know me they might think that I picked my sports teams specifically to piss off my family, friends, and region. This couldn't be further from the truth, but seriously: I like the Boston Red Sox and the Dallas Cowboys. I have decals of the teams on my car. How my car has not been keyed or egged yet is beyond my comprehension.

But believe me: I didn't pick the teams because I am some contrarian who is just being contrary for its own sake. I hate people like that. By "not conforming" they are actually conforming to an idea of nonconformity. I have always loved Dallas - I was basically obsessed with Troy Aikman as a kid. As for Boston - I started rooting for them primarily in my early teens. I had always liked them, and kind of passively rooted for them because I actively despised the Yankees, but I didn't actively root for them until a bit later. But understand this: I am no bandwagoner. These Red Sox fans who have cropped up all over the place since 2004: lame. Same with Patriots fans. I never knew a Pats fan until they won the Super Bowl in 2001, then all of a sudden everyone in my neighborhood was a die hard Pats fan. Pfft. I had barely even heard of that team with the exception of a few blurbs when they faced the Packers in the Super Bowl in the 90s.

This is also true of my politics. I live in the Northeast. Every state out here is true blue with the exception of New Hampshire which typically goes Republican but did not this year. And yet I'm a conservative in this most liberal of regions. Again, not to be contrary. Believe me, it would be a lot easier to be a conservative if I was surrounded by them. Sort of like how it's really easy to be on MSNBC because everyone at the network and all guests agree with you. It would be nice to not have to debate once in a while.

This was hugely tangential and super random. On to more pertinent issues.

I don't really have much to say concerning the whole Blagojevich scandal. The dude is sleazy as shit, he's up his eyeballs in corruption, he's your typical Chicago politician. But Obama managed to get through Chicago unscathed because he is our Savior. All I have to say about this whole shit show is this: there is no way the media would give a Republican President-elect the same benefit of the doubt they have given Obama about this whole scandal. That would never happen. The media would actually do some investigating. I am sort of interested to see what the media would do if Obama maintains much of the Bush policies contra terrorism. I can't wait to see how the fuckers squirm their way into somehow supporting the Patriot Act because now Obama is in charge. The prospect is delectable.

Bush is killing me. Besides his acrobatic move in dodging a shoe thrown at him, which was pretty impressive, he has done everything wrong lately. This whole push to nationalize Detroit is pretty pathetic. He is obviously just trying to solidify his legacy, somehow, someway, with those that hate him. Ain't gonna happen, Dubya. You have spent a disgusting amount of government money, a liberal trait, and have not done anything terribly conservative. Unless if some leftists want to argue that waging war is somehow some conservative trait. I already discussed that in the latest post. Not true. George W. Bush has disintegrated into a socialist in his last months of office, and it seems as though he is pleading with us. "Can't I do anything right?" No, in the eyes of many, you can't. You could legalize gay marriage, destroy our economy so that we can be more "green", and pull out of Iraq, etc. It doesn't matter. As far as the left is concerned, you should have never been President. You stole the presidency. So, in sum, fuck you. You can guarantee that if Bill Clinton invaded Iraq, which he supported doing, the media would be doing their darndest to support him and the effort. Swinging wildly to the left and being ridiculous won't change anything. So stop, its embarrassing. And stupid. Bailing out Detroit merely postpones the inevitable at taxpayer cost. Washington has nationalized enough.

So, a new movie coming down the chute: a 4 hour epic on the life of Ernesto "Che" Guevara, starring Benicio del Toro and directed by Steven Soderbergh. Okay, seriously: when is everyone going to stop deifying this man? He was the father of the Cuban prison system, he was a cold-blooded murderer who reveled in that role. Who uttered the following? "Hatred as an element of struggle; unbending hatred for the enemy, which pushes a human beyond his natural limitations, making him into an effective, violent, selective, and cold-blooded killing machine. This is what our soldiers must become." Dick Cheney? You woulda thunk, but no. Che Guevara, that romantic, idealistic revolutionary who adorns many a college student's t-shirt and/or dorm room, said those words. And if Bush said them, these same idiots who wear Che shirts would decry it as proof of his fascism. But Che said it. So whatever. He was fighting for socialism, and equality, and the indigenous peoples of Latin America and Africa, and all that good shit. So, yeah, maybe he did kill a few people. So what? They got in the way of his wonderful revolution. And they're making a movie glorifying this guy? Alright, then I'll write a screenplay glorifying Augusto Pinochet and then have that made into a film. No? Well, why not? All sarcasm aside, here's why: It would be stupid because Pinochet was a goddamn murderer...but so was Che, and it's therefore just as stupid. And not only stupid, but wrong.

We should be wearing t-shirts of actual heroes: George Orwell, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Vaclav Havel, Lech Walesa, the unknown rebel of Tiananmen Square, Winston Churchill. But Guevara? Uggh.