Jim Treacher's Blog That Is on the Internet

Hey Kitty, put a shirt on! Holy crap, what am I saying. Anyway, congrats to Kitty on running the Boston Marathon. It's amazing to me that people can finish those things. I can barely finish a Marathon bar without getting winded.

After A Couple Days To Ponder On It: Three Things I Learned From That Peace Poster Deal

1) Anti-war and anti-France aren't necessarily antithetical.

2) You can be as dumb as you want, as long as you're sincerely dumb.

3) I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up about that Buffy Season 2 box set until after the Amazon gift certificates were handed out.

Gawker stalker: rapid eye edition

· "4/24/03 4:15 a.m. The Prince of Darkness, sprinting towards me across a reeking field of wet red bones that stretched from horizon to horizon. Wanted to run, legs didn't work. I couldn't understand what he was screaming, but his face started looking sort of like my dad, then Osama Bin Laden, then my dad again. Just as the column of pustulant black piranha-worms that shot from his ichorous maw was about to hit me, I woke up. He looked really haggard and tired."

I'll be here all week!

(And no, I didn't use any translation programs. That probably would have taken longer than my actual method: Just try to sound as retarded, drug-addled, and plain old "ferrin" as possible. Then, if it still makes too much sense, delete a word or two at random. Happytime toady, wale size yankpals! Kissm AS CLICK)

In Other News, Tony Blair Has Just Kidnapped Commissioner Gordon

JLA #83

Written by Joe Kelly; art by ChrisCross and Tom Nguyen; cover by Doug Mahnke and Nguyen In stores July 30. President Luthor has Qurac on his hit list, and heaven help any hero who stands in the way! Now Superman finds himself in a living nightmare as his fellow Leaguers fall one by one to Lex's executive order: support the war or be "neutralized!" FC, 32 pg. $2.25

Hey, did you know Buffy the Vampire Slayer is still on? Yeah, for another few weeks. And they're talking about having some of the characters move over to Angel if it gets renewed, Spike in particular. I'm sure he'll be able to help them fight evil and all that, but they better not ask him to reach anything on the top shelf.

Looks like we've got another right-wing conspiracy on our hands, folks, and Kevin Parrott is right in the thick of it! How about not crushing everybody's dissent for once, huh, guys?

On that new Entertainment Weekly cover, the Dixie Chicks have a lot of words written on them, but there's no bush. See what I did there?

Matt Moore has a cool blog that I check out frequently, and I just realized that I hardly ever link to him, so go check out Matt.

It was only a matter of time, I suppose: Puce Watch.

Awesöme!

Get Well Soon, Chris.

(Hey, looks like he did!)

So anyway. Fametracker's Ten Least Essential Summer Films, 2003 is funny, because it's Fametracker. Here's my favorite one:

8.25. Bad Boys II

Release Date: July 18
The Plot: Martin Lawrence and Will Smith return in a sequel to their 1995 kind-of hit.
The Pitch: PAKOW! [Sound of explosions.] KAM KAM KAM! [Sound of gunshots.] YAYAYAYAYA! [Sound of Martin and Smith, trading quips.]
Why It's Inessential: 1995? Isn't there a statute of limitations on sequels? And if not, why not?

There we go. Good advice. And food for thought.

Dawn Olsen has a little announcement to make...!

Brian Perry's first entry has now been replaced by a poster illustrating that old standby, "Fucking for peace is like bombing for virginity." Or however it goes. His other two entries are still blank, but there's a link to the Avoiding Armageddon thing on PBS. Because nothing frustrates a neocon more than not destroying the world.

This one's still up, though. Maybe because I predicted she'd take it down?

Kevin Parrott just put up lots of pictures of very attractive people of both sexes with no clothes on and some of the pictures show them doing dirty dirty things to each other!^*

^*Not really, but he's feeling lonely and I thought that might get you to go visit him. Go on.

I don't care what this guy says, I still think it's Just Puce.

Brian Linse recently said something in a post unrelated to this poster-prank thing I'm so obsessed with, like the bloodthirsty warmonger I am, but I thought it was worth highlighting:

I know that a lot of the Lefty Bloggers... feel that criticism should only be directed in partisan attacks, but that's not what liberal inquiry means to me. We should never hesitate to criticize our own.

Amen!

Now Goux is replacing the "Layne Is Satan" thing when you click from the main poster page. With a John Pilger quote about evil "neocons," no less. Them pesky neocons!

Jackie over at Au Currant just put up her fake anti-war posters, which didn't make it under the radar for whatever reason. No permalink, but scroll down to the three thumbnails. I think this one is my favorite.

And to answer her question about this poster, I just got an unsolicited confirmation from creator Jerry Joplin that it is indeed a prank. (Notice how all the oil companies are French? Le d'oh!) When it's pulled from the contest page, which it will be as soon as Melanie Goux reads this, you can check it out here. It's a little blurrier, but that's how it was originally. Goux cleaned it up and took off the URL at the bottom, looks like. (Thanks for the image hosting, Michele!)

Next?

Via "Comrade Reynolds"^*, here's an article about funny war-related stuff on the Internet.

Maybe Next War!^TM

^*See Beato.

Brian Perry just put up his three posters that were taken down, as well as the two he submitted that didn't make it.

Daniel Frank says the only thing keeping that poster from winning was the failure to incorporate a picture of that little kid with his arms off. (Like this poster did.) If I had it to do all over again, I'd insist on having the soldier stand on the poor feller's torso to put up the flag. Is that a wrong thing to say?

Update: Michele has some more thoughts on the poster exploiting that kid's injuries. Also, I just noticed that the four missing spaces on the main contest page are in the shape of a knight's move in chess. I hereby dub myself Sir Pranks-A-Lot.

Well, the Brushstroke lady took down our fake peace posters and replaced them with a slam on Ken Layne. (Filename: kenlayneass.jpg. Take that, fascist!) Kind of figured they wouldn't last long.

I don't know about Brian Perry's three entries yet, but here's a thumbnail of ours (click it to see the full-size deal):

FREE SPEEEEEEEEECH!!! :p LOL OMG

Update: Yeah, true, that Satan-Layne thing is pretty cool.

It is instructive to download that little Madonna snippet and put it on repeat. The clip is about 10 seconds long, so that's 360 instances of self-righteous hectoring from an insanely overprivileged harridan per hour. After enduring 15-20 minutes of this, you will never, ever see another Madonna movie again. (Tee-hee!)

What the fuck do I think I'm doing? I'm downloading "Democracy, Whiskey, Sexy" by Dr. Frank, that's what the fuck.

You guys aren't gonna let that little punk A. Beam beat me, are you? CLICK CLICK

Brian Perry's e-mail explaining his three prank posters, presented here with his permission and without comment:

Hello, I've learned from your examples, and through a combination of imagery and text that the anti-war folks find irresistible, I have succeeded in having three entries accepted into the brushstroke.tv anti-war poster contest. The unfortunate thing for them is that my images range from pro-war to nearly nonsense. Exposed biases and ignorance, anyone? Here are links to my entries and a brief write-up on each one. [Whoops! These have been taken down too. Click here for details.]

"Think of the children"

Celebrating Iraqi children on an Abrams tank. The text is a sentimental throwaway phrase. I guess the juxtaposition of the kids and the tank is good enough to be considered anti-war, regardless of whether the children have been freed from a brutal dictator by said tank, and whether the kids are happy to be there. Huh. Just make the tank red, do some scary image degradation, color the text with scary colors, add some pablum, and blammo! It's an anti-war poster.

"Don't trust anyone over 80"

Donald Rumsfeld close up. A takeoff on the familiar '60s saying to not trust anyone over 30, this frightening red Donald Rumsfeld invites sneering. Only one problem -- Rumsfeld is 72, suckaz. Additionally, what could anti-war types find offensive about people older than 80? Madness!

"Dissent=Truth"

Mohammed Al-Douri in blue. Right off the bat, a blatantly false statement that anti-war types would want so badly to be true they let it go. To make things worse, the text is on top of the Iraqi UN ambassador who blasted us at the security council and then, as soon as Baghdad fell, stated that "Americans are good people" and that he loved New York. And to consider the America-bashing he spouted at the UN as "dissent" -- that is total wackjob territory.

So that's all for the time being. I didn't think the anti-war crowd had much credibility, but this takes it up a notch. These echo-chamber groupies have completely traded reason for hatred of America. They are the ones who are so intelligent and reasoned in their arguments, and yet they pass this stuff as legit. Thanks for the link. I hope I win the gift certificate!

--------Brian Perry

P.S. Two of my entries were declined. The first was a close up of Pres. Bush with the text "There's no 'Oil' in Democracy." The second was Jacques Chirac with the phrase "Don't blame me -- I vetoed for Chirac." Not sure why they were rejected, but hey, I'll take what I can get.

Oh, I forgot to mention something about that peace poster prank. Let's see if we can get Parrott to post the cover letter he sent with that entry. It's a work of art all by itself.

(And there it is.)

Maybe it's just me, but isn't "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" the only question to ask anybody who's actually seeking out Madonna's music?

I was talking to Kevin Parrott about that peace poster contest I tried to enter, and we decided to collaborate on a poster. We wanted something that would squeeze as many dumb ideas about the war as possible into one indelible image. Something so irrational, so wrongheaded, so jaw-droppingly stupid that it would serve as a litmus test between those with genuine concerns about the war and the seething, traffic-blocking cranks who think Bush is the worst guy who ever lived. Something that would make Ted Rall jump up and go, "Yeah!" Something that would make Ann Coulter puke with revulsion, assuming she actually had anything travelling through her alimentary canal that week.

Plus, hey, Amazon.com gift certificate for 1st place. Why not?

I came up with the basic concept and slogans, Kevin did the other 95% of the work, and we submitted it under the gender-neutral nom de goof of "Lee Rittner." Our entry didn't win anything, but I think it's pretty funny anyway:

So, did anybody else pull off a peace poster prank?

(Note: Within hours of this post, our entry was removed from the contest.)

"Yummy, yummy, yummy, I got lung in my tummy..."

From e-mail...

You're a dick!

Correction: I'm a neo-dick!

You know how whenever you go to bobanddavid.com, you keep accidentally running your cursor over the little guy in the upper-right corner, and he spouts his little catchphrase? It's really annoying, but it would be cool if Onstad had done something similar with the last panel of yesterday's Achewood. Like if you moused over it, you'd hear the "Subway! E-e-eat Fresh!!" jingle. That would add just the right note of irony to Pat's abject humiliation at the hands of his former rival Vlad, the Eastern European robot with a mustache and a competing sandwich franchise.

I do hope you'll read this Boing Boing message board thread about the "CNN made the people boo Michael Moore!" urban legend. Or maybe you're not ready for the TRUTH?

Snopes doesn't have anything on this yet, but they did debunk one of Moore's previous conspiracy theories.

Update: Oooh! And Puce gives his review, possibly:

1 fattyank less devel, award, 'wale fit of tuxode?' but say real but Cnn as make boo electron change for MEDEA LIES. Hide? CLICK

J.R. "Bob" Hussein?

Check out this interview with Chris Onstad, who does Achewood, which I plug in this blog about once every, I don't know, 72 hours or so. So I think I'm set until Monday.

Uh-oh!

Update: Looks like Puce's permalinks aren't working. Well, here's his(?) review of yours truly. I think:

Funnie find, all my dudes! Oh, man tell many chortel, how be so genius? IDIOT CLICK

Via Jeff and Michele, please enjoy the unique word-stylings of... Puce.

Since it looks like I'm getting more hits than usual this morning, I figured I'd take the opportunity to put all 25 of those Onion-style headlines I did last week in one place. (You know, like how each member of the Onion staff has to come up with 25 headlines every week? Seemed like a fun challenge.) I just sort of posted them as I thought of them, so here's the unbroken list. If you've already read these, I don't want to hear it because that's what your scrollbar is for:

Ja Rule Flatly Rejects Demands To Halt Fronting Campaign

Aaron Brown To Finish Thought

Area Boy Touched On Boy Area

Natalie Maines: "We're More Popular Than Mohammed Now"

Kim Jong-il Thinks He's People

Bob Newhart Anticipates Call From Lorne Michaels, Practices New Zealand Accent [Insert picture of Peter Arnett]

Another Emaciated Blonde Finds Self Trapped In Dance Sequence With Christina Applegate

Lenny Kravitz Fails To, Rocks Vote

John Gibson Vainly Represses Thirst For Human Blood

Class Of '87 Starting To Feel It

Pestilence Ups Ante

Stalin Hosts "Meet 'n' Greet" For Saddam

April 1st Renamed "Fuck All Jeters Day"

Sneer Quotes Considered

Dan Rather Ignores Pesky Sprites

Southpaw Ruins Money Shot

Jack Bauer's Colon Explodes

Toby Keith Finds Rhyme For "Stand Bigger"

Skarsgård Proud To Introduce New SARS-Gards^TM

Cellular Phone Triggers Cellular Division

Geraldo Learns To Love Self

Loaf Pinched

Rumsfeld Torments Press Corps With Bolts Of Mystic Energy

Freedom Fries Renamed Imperialist Baby-Killer Crisps

Jobless Blogger Fends Off Suicidal Impulses For Another Week

No, that's not me. The guy who sent me this picture wants to protect his identity to avoid reprisals from Not In Our Name.

A Few Phrases To Remember During Your Interview With Al-Jazeera

"I consider myself a people person."

"I'm a results-oriented team player with a drive to excel."

"There is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is his prophet."

What The Phone Call Between Bush And Chirac Might Have Sounded Like If They Talked Like Me And My Stupid Friend Chris, The Time He Promised To Help Me Move But Then Bailed Because He Said He Had To Drive His Girlfriend To The Airport Since Her Car Was In The Shop, Which Was Bullshit Because I Talked To Her Afterwards And She Said Her Car Was Fine And He Probably Just Sat On His Fat Ass And Played Vice City All Fucking Day, And Then A Couple Weeks Later He Called Me And Tried To Invite Himself To My Housewarming Party Because He's A Goddamn Douchebag, But Anyway

Chirac: George? It's Jacques.

[Pause]

C: George?

Bush: Yeah, I'm here.

C: Hey!

[Pause]

C: So hey, man, just wanted to catch up and everything. Congratulations on Iraq, man! That is so awesome.

[Pause]

C: 'Cause I know we sort of weren't really, you know, on the same page or whatever, but it's cool, right? You're not gonna be a--

B: Was there something you wanted, Jacques? Kind of busy.

C: Right, whoa. Wow. Okay. Yeah, uh, you know, I'm actually calling to congratulate you, dude, I'm glad that things worked out and shit, so I think you could at least be a little more--

[CLICK]

[Pause]

C: Hello? What the fuck?!?

Be sure to enter Neal Pollack's Syria-Related Pun Contest. Looks like the permalinks on his letters page aren't working, but my entry is around there somewhere.

Cory Doctorow asks: "Did CNN turn up the boos on Michael Moore's Oscars speech?" And this lady and this gentleman provide compelling evidence. I mean, just look at that fucking waveform. Did the Capitalist Neocon Network really think anybody was gonna fall for that?

Although in CNN's defense, they were just trying to drown out Moore's disrespectful reference to "Saddam" instead of "President Saddam Hussein, the King of Pop."

They're showing a Black Books mini-marathon on Comedy Central overnight tonight. Check local listings. Sounds like 3 of the 4 episodes are from the second series, which I missed the first time around because CC ran it really early on Sunday mornings. Dicks. Well, at least they got rid of Chris Wylde. (See here for why I like this show so much.)

Here's an MP3 of that "Rappin' Saddam" thing. (Thanks, Steve!)

Well, since Layne let the cat out of the bag, here's my poster:

I submitted it a couple of days ago, and they still haven't posted it. I want that Amazon.com gift certificate!

LAYNE RULES

"Hey, didn't anybody tell Bush? That museum had oil paintings!" Everybody's probably used that joke already, right? It's kind of the obvious joke, I guess.

[Insert Austin Powers Reference About Exposing Someone's True Gender Here]

Look at the size of that mitt. And the gruffness, the Adam's apple, the hair, the remarkable fashion sense... There's a lot going on there, and I find much of it disturbing yet strangely alluring. Fuck Baghdad Bob, why doesn't this one have a fan page yet? P.S. It was a scratch, not a pick.

P.P.S. Well, that explains it.

By the way, if you guys use any of these signs at a protest, you'll take pictures and send them to me, right?

"Sure, Saddam had his faults... but at least he protected the good stuff from the common rabble!"

My days are finished and I will die
All I need is chili fries

If anybody finds an MP3 of this anti-Saddam rap, please let me know. Layne calls it "Psyops in our time," which I guess it is.

Coolio got pissed when Weird Al did a "Gangsta's Paradise" parody, so I wonder what he thinks of them using the song for this. Although the CIA is probably a little more formidable than the guy who sang "My Bologna."

Update: Duh. That BBC page has a RealAudio link to the song. Here, check it out. Sounds like these guys were having fun. I think we can waive the "No Playa-Haytaz" rule just this once.

So you've seen all these ads for Bulletproof Monk, right? Chow Yun-Fat's obviously been working hard on his English, and the camera loves him, and the other dude is sort of funny, and it looks like a fun, stupid action flick. I'm vaguely aware that it's based on some comic book I've never read, and every time I see one of those ads I think, "Well, good for them. Glad to see some struggling comics guys finally getting real money and recognition for their work."

WHOOOPS!!

(Oh, and I got that link from Dirk Deppey at TCJ Journalista. Which I admit that I only tend to read when he links to me, but it's a cool blog.)

The mighty COOP has asked me to pass along this correction:

Hey, Treacher, you no-fish-n-chips-having, born insecure, rat soup-eatin' motherfucker, at least give me my props when you post that "DRUNKARDS FOR MILLIONAIRE" logo! ["DRUNKARDS FOR HELLMAN," but okay. -- JT]

Shit, bitch, don't make me get out my talcum powder, coz then you know you gonna get BITCH-SLAPPED!! [I think this is a line from a pimp movie or something. More of a reader, myself. -- JT]

Did I mention that COOP is awesome?

Update: That line is from the 2001 Method Man/Redman buddy comedy about smoking drugs, How High. (Good eye, Mom!)

Here's another member of Treacher's Pets. One day science will find a cure and I'll be able to leave this plastic bubble, and on that day... look out, ladies! Because my smeary palmprints will be all over your windows.

Speaking of stalkers, Dawn just gave her site a makeover. I like the new logo!

DRUNKARDS FOR HELLMAN

(The picture is of Tony Millionaire, by the way. There's more fun stuff with that picture here.)

No matter what side of the political spectrum you're on, if you are incapable of feeling at least a tiny amount of joy at watching ordinary Iraqis celebrate this, you are lost to the ideological left. And let me also add, if you are incapable of feeling badly that we even had to use force in the first place, you are ideologically lost to the right. And I would inform both of those groups to leave the room now and do not watch the program. It's like ice-skating: We throw out the high score and the low score. The rest of the people, you're welcome at the table.

--Jon Stewart, The Daily Show

Please come to the table. There's plenty of room.

Cory Doctorow points out the latest Get Your War On, which he thought was "very nice." I guess I was somewhat less impressed, and here's my humble attempt to reply:

You would think there would be very few people anywhere who would be upset by today's news from Baghdad. But, as has become obvious, beyond those who merely and honestly sought peace or greater consensus, there remain groups who were invested in the idea that the Coalition couldn't, or shouldn't, succeed.

In other words, not a really good day to be French.

--Keith Olbermann, MSNBC

Come on now, stomp on that birthday cake. Stomp on it!

Onstad seems to be enjoying "Nice Pete" way too much. I know I am.

Agonist. What a dipshit. Next time anybody wants to tell me I "don't post enough," just keep in mind that at least every stupid joke and half-hearted insight here is mine and mine alone (or credited as otherwise).

Update: Layne has more, like, smarter comments and stuff about it.

CSI: Achewood

25. Jobless Blogger Fends Off Suicidal Impulses For Another Week

Yay, I did it. Would you look at all this ticker tape.

20. Cellular Phone Triggers Cellular Division
21. Geraldo Learns To Love Self
22. Loaf Pinched
23. Rumsfeld Torments Press Corps With Bolts Of Mystic Energy
24. Freedom Fries Renamed Imperialist Baby-Killer Crisps

Huh. With the darker hair, Welch does kind of look like Ben Affleck. You have to look off to the side a bit and use your peripheral vision, but...

Just kidding. Break a leg, Matt!

19. Skarsgård Proud To Introduce New SARS-Gards^TM

18. Toby Keith Finds Rhyme For "Stand Bigger"

Another love letter. (At least I think that's what it is... the Google translation is unclear, and I'm a product of the American school system.)

Subj: signs
Date: 4/3/2003
From: youreanashole@hotmail.com

hey asshole,

how bout these, for signs..... you could add these to your blog site

they're anti-anti-anti-war signs:

Jesus Lovers! Turn the other Cheek!
Don't Bash the French unless You'll Bash the Pope Too!
Trust the President! He's really Smart!
Feel our Love Bombs!!!
Bombing you into Freedom!!!!

just some ideas.... hope you like them

love,
asshole

The important thing is that you tried real hard and did your best!

17. Jack Bauer's Colon Explodes

And so he's back. From outer space.

14. Sneer Quotes Considered
15. Dan Rather Ignores Pesky Sprites
16. Southpaw Ruins Money Shot

12. Stalin Hosts "Meet 'n' Greet" For Saddam
13. April 1st Renamed "Fuck All Jeters Day"

(Hey, you guys do realize I wasn't attacking celebrities, right? I was making fun of the "Bush is a worse dictator than Saddam!" types. If that were the case, right now Aaron Sorkin would be scrambling to come up with storylines for Tim Matheson. No, the celebrities were just civilian casualties. Which is unfortunate, but this is a war. (Well, okay, I guess I am attacking the idea that Janeane Garofalo's free speech is somehow being crushed because people are saying mean things about her. She just sounds ridiculous when she whines about that crap. But I'm not like, "Send them Hollyweird faggots to Baghdad where they belong!" I do try to be a little more sophisticated than that.) Well, sorry to get all serious and explain the joke.)

11. Pestilence Ups Ante

Update: Okay, that's better...

(For Neal.)