Political fanatics are idiots... or morons, I haven't yet decided...

I think people who are rabidly rooting for any politician are idiots. Ok, maybe not idiots... perhaps morons. Yeah, that's better. I'm going with "morons," people: deal with it.

I shall elucidate. :-) Unless you are the candidate himself (or herself, don't get your knickers in a twist, ladies), you were sired by the candidate, you are the lifelong spouse of the candidate, or are somehow related by blood to the candidate, there is simply no way that you could be so sure that the person isn't some conniving scuzzbucket that isn't lying through his teeth about everything he says, and is secretly scheming to take over the world while stroking a cat all day in his hidden evil lair?

Actually, you could even argue that if you're related or married to the candidate you're definitely sure that he's a lying scuzzbucket (like that time he told you your cat Miffy had gone to a farm in the country when in reality it had been in-grained in an 18-wheeler's tires, or like that time he told you he was working late in the office when in reality he was doing lines of coke off of the ass of a Brazilian hooker he met in Cabo).

How could people that have never met the candidate adore him so much, how can they be so sure he's the one who's gonna save the nation from foreign attacks and fix the economy and create jobs and make kittens crap gold and turn the Grand Canyon into a flowing river of milk and honey and convert the Everglades into a sugarplum forest full of gumdrops and candycanes? Maybe I'm just a cynic (yeah, right, "maybe")... but how can you be so sure of any of that if you personally don't know the guy? Or even if you do personally know the guy? Or even if you are the guy? (I mean, it's real easy to over-estimate one's own abilities as a creator of a sugarplum forest).

What is your own take on this topic? Is over-zealous fanatism for a political candidate reasonable? [Note that if you say it is, I will think you are a moron: you have been warned!]

I just voted!

I just came back from voting. The supermarket where I thought they had early voting polling stations did not have any (actually, one of their employees told me she herself had heard radio commercials saying there would be voting stations there, too, but their manager had told them that wasn't so: democracy and bureaucracy working together again)! So, I ended up voting at Home Depot. Not exactly poetic, but hey, whatever.

So, the process itself was ridiculously simple, so simple in fact that even a Florida voter would not have been able to fuck it up. Everything took place on a computer screen (which looked touch-screen but wasn't, and it was fortunate that someone explained the process to me before beginning because otherwise I would have quickly started feeling quite disenfranchised had I thought they had given me a booth with a faulty touch-screen!); there was a scroll wheel that you rolled around to change the current selection (kind of like an iPod, but more democratic), and a button you pushed to go to the next screen.

You could vote straight down party lines or choose exactly the candidates you wanted, even for some positions that I didn't even know existed and suspect are made-up, like County Commissioner, Constable, County Tax Assessor, and Bejeweled High Priestess of the Gjórì Nôoku Order (although I might be wrong about that last one). At the end of the process it reviewed whom you chose for each position (even the ones I suspect are fake), and you hit a button that said "Submit Ballot" (Note for Florida voters: that button would submit your ballot), and voilà! (Note for Florida votes: "voilà" means roughly "that's it").

All in all, it was definitely worth the 5 minutes it took to vote. :-)

I'm about to vote!

I am about to leave to go vote, to exercise that inalienable right we all have that is utterly important for our country; well, no, not necessarily, at least not where I live.

See, in Texas, thanks to the ever-so-clever electoral college system, voting is a waste of time and money. One party always has a majority of the vote; so, if you vote for the majority party, your unnecessary vote will not help your candidate win another swing state where he actually needs your vote, and if you vote for the minority party, your insufficient vote will not be enough to win your candidate your state's electoral votes.

Still, it's not like I would be curing cancer if I stay at home; plus, I am going to vote at a supermarket and I needed some milk anyway, so what the hey!

I have decided to go alone because of the people I would have gone with are rabidly political, whereas I am more neutral and am doing it mostly because I had never voted here before and wanted to see what the process was like (would I have to deal with pregnant chads, pulling levers, using a touch-screen, make my mark with goat's blood, or what have you).

One of the reasons I wanted to go alone was I really hate when people ask you: "Who did you vote for?". For starters, it's "Whom did you vote for?", but I guess that's neither here nor there (which makes me wonder where the fuck it is, after all). Anyhoo, I feel it's like being in a store's dressing room and asking the guy in the stall next to you what his waist size is: true, it's not like it's a state secret whose violation will cost thousands of lives, but still, really, it's none of your fucking business. Finally, what's the point of having a secret ballot voting system if you're gonna be telling everyone whom you voted for, right?

I may decide to rant some more about politics after I'm done voting. Wish me luck! ;-)

God help me, I am addicted to the "Cleopatra 2525" theme song... HELP ME, JEEBUS!

I am so ashamed to admit it, but after completely mocking the theme song for "Cleopatra 2525" a few posts ago, I have since... become addicted to it! I know, I know: "For shame, Rafa... For shame! It's just so bad... it's good!

I am now wishing some channel, any channel, even UPN or WB, would start rerunning the show just so I can watch it in its full splendor... even if it's playing at like 4 AM on Sundays: it's cool, my TiVo will pick it up.

I now have to look for some sort of support group, like "Cleopatra 2525 Theme Songoholics Anonymous" (C2TSA, for short)... I need help!!! SOMEBODY HELP ME, PLEASE!!! ;-)

Having children: the most egoistic act in the world

[RANT_ON]

Many people believe, for whatever misguided reasons, that having children is one of the more selfless and ennobling acts a human being can undertake; that it is the deposition of the self for the sake of another. The way I see it, having children is the single most egoistic, self-centered thing a person can do.

You may ask parents why they had children: reasons will vary from "I wanted to bring a child into the world so he or she could grow up to be a good person," to "I wanted to have a piece of me and my husband/wife to give to the world."

While these may sound altruistic at first glance, they are innately egoistic reasons: the truth is, having children makes the parents happy, it satisfies their desires to be good parents, to "give to society," to have a part of them live on in the world.

In fact, bringing innocent life into this shitty world is probably the cruelest act a human being can inflict on someone else; this world is teeming with misery, full to the rafters of unloved, uncared-for children that will never know a happy existence, and yet people, in their self-centered ignorance, deem it necessary to bring forth more life into this hapless planet. Why? What is the use?

In my opinion, adopting children is the more noble act; while you may argue that people's motivations for becoming parents are still pretty much due to self-satisfaction, it is inarguable that Man is a hedonistic animal and in its roots, even the most seemingly altruistic act is done to bring some degree of pleasure to the doer. However, in the realm of self-serving acts, adopting a child means removing him or her from an environment where he or she is probably unloved, or not taken care of as he or she should be; it means introducing a child into a home of full of love, of people who are willingly take on the responsibilities of parenthood and who will probably improve that child's life tenfold, and thus help in reducing some of the crappiness that prevails in the world.

If the world were even half-way decent, there would be a moratorium on having children until after all abandoned and orphaned children had found themselves a loving home... but, alas, the world is yet far, far away from being even half-way decent.

[RANT_OFF]

Sorry I didn't bring the funny today; I just had to vent. :-)

Possibly the crappiest theme song ever: "Cleopatra 2525"!

Oh my God... You have not heard a crappy theme song until you've heard the one for "Cleopatra 2525," which I link here for your listening pleasure. I cannot do it justice, so please listen to it yourself before proceeding. Go on: I'll wait.

Welcome back. :-) Ok, these are the lyrics of the song, as I hear them, transcribed as phonetically as I can (feel free to follow along!):

[Narratrix]
Five hundred years into the future
She will enter a world where machines rule the Earth
Mankind has been driven underground
And Cleopatra is about to discover
There's no place like home

[Songstress]
In the yeeh, twenny-figh twenny-figh
There women with the will to soobigh
Fighting fo' a brand new day
Nothin' gonna get in they way

In the yeeh, twenny-figh twenny-figh
Three women kee' hope aligh
Joinin' forces to reclaim the Earr-ah
Lookin' ahead-ah to humankind's rebirr

It's as though the theme song is sung by Buckwheat's lounge singer sister.

In case you're unfamiliar with the show, here is its premise according to IMDB:

An exotic dancer, cryogenically frozen in the year 2001, is accidentaly thawed out in 2525 by two female warriors who are fighting against evil robots which have taken over the world. The three join forces and try to escape the underground caverns to which humanity has been banished, meeting up with all sorts of strange creatures along the way.

And no, I only wish I were making that up... if I could make up shit that good, apparently I'd have a job as a TV writer!

Anyhoo, I figure this would be a nice topic: can you come up with other shows with really crappy/cheesy theme songs, and/or crappy/cheesy plots? Let's hear 'em, folks! :-)