I think it's strange and frightening how little it takes to be accused of Anti-Americanism or hating America nowadays.

Time was you had to do more than say you disagree with the President or his policies. You had to be a communist, or at least an alleged communist. You had to, say, wish America ill or something along those lines. No longer.

That's problematic, to say the least. Because we don't live in Napoleon's France. L'etat, she is not Bush. Historians have suggested that we have been heading toward an imperial presidency for some time, and that is not good news. It's bad not because the current president is George W. Bush, but because it goes against the very principles of our form of government, as I understand them

Much of the energy poured into the creation of the US was put toward preventing tyranny by putting checks on political power. The specific bicameral nature of our federal legislature was designed to balance the power of populous and less populous states. Judicial review checks the power of the legislature. etc. etc.

Why does it seem like people are so fond of pooling political power in the hands of a single executive? Why do people stand behind the president as the primary manifestation of the state?

I have ideas about this. They are mostly opinions, and not too well informed. Anyways... People like to be led. Most of the people I have known, including myself, are not, as it were, totally self-propelled. That's one of the features of government in general- that it organizes people to a cause or purpose. People like to identify with power, because it makes them feel powerful. They don't necessarily want to share in that power directly, but they want to be associated with it. American politics is a spectator sport. Every two years we sort of have a say in it, but the rest of the time we cheer our side. And we tend to cheer the star player most of all.

I don't think it's really a cult-of-personality thing. Because our current President owes most of his popularity to party affiliation, air of inevitability, and the fact that a bunch of Islamist terrorists blew themselves up along with 3,000 Americans. He's personally engaging, I gather from Alexandra Pelosi's documentary, but otherwise he's a dud. He's a very poor speaker- although he benefits greatly from the soft bigotry of our low expectations- and terrible at communicating ideas, especially complex or uncomfortable ones.

The perception of Bush as the defender an imperiled United States is what makes our president, in many ways, a sacred cow. If I were cynical, and sometimes I am, I would say that it behooves Bush to imperil the United States, because there is no more powerful a figure than a US president who is a sacred cow.

The way things are is not the way they should be. My attitudes toward our chief executive should not constitute Anti-Americanism. They should constitute a distrust of unchecked power used unwisely. And this distrust is as American as apple pie.

Oh, Colin Qvinn.

His show on Comedy Central is called Tugh Crowd. Presumably, and I'm not being smart, because that's what stand up comedians sometimes say when they have a hostile audience/are bombing on stage. I just think it's interesting that one of the less competent performers on television has specifically that as the name for his show.

Colin Qvinn is exceptional primarily because he is the only host of SNL's Weekend Update who was worse than Norm McDunald. Colin Qvinn can't read. I don't mean that he's illiterate, just that he has no timing whatsoever. The only time I ever liked him as a performer was when he played Artie's idiot son on The Larry Sanders Show.

But now he has his own show on Comedy Central. Why?
I'm writing about this, honestly, because I'm offended by his show. I watch the Daily Show whenever I can, and I've caught Tugh Crowd a couple of times. To start of with, the show is infrequently funny. Qvinn's delivery is a cringe-inducing to me as the president's. Fortunately, the president doesn't speak that often, and when he does he's very coached, or at least seems it. And another thing: these guys think bigotry is cute.

Obviously not all of them. But Colin, his good buddy Nick DePolo, and Jim Nerton, two of the most frequent guests, think being an asshole is funny. Colin thinks he's a badass, Nick DePolo is the most embarrassing caricature of an Italian-American I can think of, and Jim Norton just gives me the skeevies. Jim Nerton is Se7en gross. He even looks like a rapist. Nick DePolo is jingoistic, uninformed, unfunny, and seems to think that throwing around Andrew Dice Clay-worthy slurs and epithets make him a comedian. Why is it taboo to make racist statements? Because it's ugly. Because it provokes tensions and divides us. Because it hurts people. Because it's stupid. Because... anyone who knows their history knows why.
Which isn't to say that we should avoid racial issues in humor. Or self-censor. But being an asshole isn't funny.
My problem with these guys is an issue I think is related to All in the Family. Half of the people who watched that show didn't know that it was satirical. They thought that Archie Bunker was a legitimate representative for white blue collar Americans. They thought he was cool.

The problem with this is that transgression is just transgression. Transgression done only for attention and shock value is trash. When Nick DePolo makes sport of Adrian Brody's nose because, hey, Jewish people have big noses, he's just being a jerk. He's not trying to break us out of apathy or provoking thought, he's making fun of Jews. How edgy.

Tugh Crowd has many problems in general. It's just not really a great idea to have stand-up comedians debate important issues of the day. I mean, is there anything more ironic than Jim Norton deriding Hollywood anti-war people as phony, ill-informed "jizz-bags" a full ten minutes after he's weighed in on the issue of torture? Bill Mayer's shows have had similar problems, but both Real-Time and Politically Incorrect have had the benefit of having a competent, provocative, and articulate host. And the focus of those shows is more the debate than the humor, which helps.

The bottom line is that Tugh Crowd sucks. It follows one of the best shows on television, and it compares unfavorably to Mad TV. I can't wait till it's cancelled.

I am about to set sail for my lovely place of business. It is an exciting place, and it fulfills me.

There are few things in this life that cause me true pleasure. My job is one of them.

Hmm. There's a war going on, they say.

Since these blogs are supposed to be a place in which people spout off about events like war and international relations, etc., I'm going to put my two cents in.

I don't think this war is necessary, especially this war. I would characterize the American lead-up to this war as something of a diplomatic fiasco. As has been said a million times on a million blogs, when you lose a propaganda war with Saddam Hussein, you know you've screwed up. And maybe that's an exaggeration, but in the past few months we've seen worldwide protests the likes of which I have never seen. Granted, I'm very young. But it does seem that the Bush administration has managed to reinforce every cliche of the Ugly American.

It should have been easy to generate support for the ouster of Saddam, who is a genuinely bad man. But Bush and co. failed to do this. As I am not, not have I ever been, a fan of George W. Bush, I perhaps lack the objectivity to determine why the administration failed to generate a meaningfully large coalition, but I can tell you why I wasn't sold on this war.
I do not trust Bush. I never felt that his motives were genuine, for this war and in general. But I think that I could have been persuaded if presented with credible and honest evidence that the Iraqi regime not only had WMDs, but was capable of delivering them in such a way that would seriously endanger Americans and the world in general. I would also have liked to be convinced that Saddam had a credible intention of attacking American interests any time soon.

But I was not persuaded. There were no smoking guns. As far as I know, there still aren't. And much of the supposed evidence provided or acknowledged by the administration has turned out not to be credible, and in certain circumstances to be forged or plagiarized.

Then there are other reasons that I have heard, though don't necessarily agree with including the whole neoconservative masterplan angle and Bushco's extensive relationships in the oil and oil services industries.

From my persepective, I can't say how well the war is going. It doesn't look it's going to be an easy war for the allied forces, and it definitely doesn't look like it's going to be an easy war for the Iraqis. (by which I mean Iraqi military regulars, irregular forces, and civilians) I sincerely hope the war is short and considerably less bloody as certain former U.S. Generals seem to think it may become. I hope Saddam and the whole Baathist regime is succesfully removed from power and that a free society can bloom in Iraq. But I question whether this war was really the only way to have accomplished that result, or the best.

I wish the allied forces and the Iraqi people luck. I wish the people of Iraq justice and peace.

Hello and Welcome to the wonderful world of Poop Ruiz.
I can't honestly tell you what will be found here. I hope it won't be an embarrassment.
Hopefully it will be wonderful. Let's see.