What This Country Needs is a Monarch (and Another Baby Geniuses Sequel)

Sweden’s Solution to Their Economic Crisis? Adding a Fifteenth Type of Recycling Bin

Actually, no. But there is an interesting piece in the New York Times today about how their government coped with a similar deregulation-induced lending/housing frenzy and subsequent crash that has once again made me pine for the land of recycling, atheism, Absolut vodka, and internet piracy. I would probably like to read a little more about the whole situation from a few other sources before I commence dry humping a photo of King Gustaf and quietly moaning their national anthem (I had thought their crash had more to do with the implosion of the neighboring Soviet Union), but it offers an interesting (and convincing) diagnosis and prescription. It certainly seems a little more reasonable than the plan Hank Paulson is pitching and its unsettling 32-word ass-covering clause.

More Search Term Goodness

Well slap her with your firm pimp hand then, son!

redundancy rant

There is a grammatical abomination so vile it grinds my teeth and loads my shotgun. I am not referring to the common [and equally serious] travesties like there, they’re, their, your, you’re, its, and it’s. No friends, I speak of the persistent misconstruing of common and obvious acronyms. Conveniently, the two standouts in this category are highly related. So for the last time:

There is no such thing as an “ATM machine”, and it does not accept “PIN numbers”

Should you wish to continue propagating this destructive folly, by all means. I rarely have the opportunity to shoot anything.

As a side note, does anyone recall the Windows 2000 boot up screen advertising “Based on NT technology”? (for the uninitiated, NT stands for New Technology)

And What Rough Beast, Its Hour Come Round At Last, Gathers Round the Good Stuff?

Who Would’ve Thought This Awful Pasta Is Actually From Pizza Hut?

Ladies and gentlemen, we live in the golden age of Pizza Hutting. The past few months have seen a spate of ads which feature a series of average joes and janes walking into a classy restaurant, being fed lousy food, and being absolutely shocked-SHOCKED!-that it is actually Pizza Hut. Or Carl’s Jr. Or Windows Vista. Edward Bernays is either laughing his ass off or kicking himself for not thinking of this. Either way, he’s doing it in hell.

Like Penn and Teller’s admittedly unscientific “tests” that revolve around humiliating pretentious socialites by feeding them dog food in a classy restaurant and telling them it’s a delicacy (kind of a reverse Pizza Hutting), these commercials are effective because they show us how frequently misguided our conceptions of a product are. The power that suggestion has upon influencing a person’s opinion is immense. Some people will, despite the nauseous grimacing, tell you (and themselves honestly believe) that the pile of garbage they are eating is delicious if they believe it’s fine cuisine. And many times, provided the revelation of the true nature of the meal isn’t too embarrassing, people will roll with it, have a laugh, and enjoy another cheesy thin crust pizza.

As usual, the free market has failed to realize or apply the glorious civic possibilities of what they have discovered. Like an untrained palate making first contact with sturgeon caviar, the woefully uninformed electorate is occasionally repulsed by new and different ideas – that is, until you tell it that it’s wholesome, American, and associated with their political party (the ideology of which they tend not to fully grasp). Some say that America is a center-right country. That’s probably true, but I would like to see it put to the test. I want to Pizza Hut a bunch of likely voters. Give them a menu of policy positions, ask them which ones they prefer, then defy them to correctly associate them with the party that tends to espouse those views. It’s not unlikely that after being presented a choice between right-wing and left-wing positions they’ll choose the former. But there’s still the chance that when presented with the lefty policies I hold so dear, they may start to see in them what I see in them and begin bringing about the changes that I (and many other degenerate left-coasters) think this country needs. But hell, even if they don’t, at least they’ll know what the fuck they are talking about and why they are in the political party that they are in. I remember the Dairy Queen in my hometown rechristened their french fries “freedom fries” after 9/11. God bless ‘em for trying, but if they really wanted to show how patriotic they were, they would Pizza Hut the living hell out of the voting public.

Still, it’s best not to put all my faith eggs in one delicious, deep dish basket. If the findings of this daring duo of political scientists are to be believed – and I think they are – it might take more than a simple pizza parlor trick to precipitate a 1980 style political realignment. In the meantime, I’ll be slouching towards Pizza Hut to be shorn another few bucks for a salty pile of sauce and cheese.