Right wing twats

Overheard on O’Reilly last night (God help me for clicking over):

"I do think we’re living in a time when people are enjoying the deaths of their loved ones."

–From some no-name Ann Coulter acolyte, referring to 9/11 widows who dare criticize the president. Why not just call ‘em cunts and get it over with? Seems to me that’s where our political discourse is headed — left and right down the gutter.

Forgive me if I’ve helped sell one copy of Coulter’s book, but fortunately I’m not that influential.

Breathe in the traquility

The Aurora Austrails, captured over the South Pole Stat

ion in Antarctica

My new look

The Malcontent goes uptown. Actually, my patience was tested one time too many by Blogger. I will maintain that page for archives and such, but this is my new home. I think we’ll all be much happier here.

These are a few of my least favorite things

Actually, this union makes a lot of sense. NASCAR claims to be a sport, but I’ve never quite understood what’s sporting about having a machine do most of  your work.

Likewise, Scientology claims to be a religion, and we all know that’s bullshit. So perhaps these fellow money-grubbers deserve each other.

Racin’ fans, brace yourselves for some couch-jumping news: Scientology is ridin’ shotgun.

A No. 27 red Taurus emblazoned with "DIANETICS" and featuring the volcano from the cover of L. Ron Hubbard’s book has been tearing around California’s Irwindale Speedway.  …

NASCAR is decidedly reluctant to comment on Scientology’s sponsorship. "This has generated a lot of interest the past few days," NASCAR PR man Scott Warfield tells me. Not surprisingly, he didn’t want to say much more. "It’s not really something we want to comment on. It’s a minor league, small-team sponsorship deal."

Yes, and it’s also the weirdest sponsorship since Boudreaux’s Butt Paste, the diaper-rash cream that began sponsoring a Busch Series car in 2005.

Driver Kenton Gray, of La Verne, Calif., will drive the DIANETCS car Saturday in its official debut in a NASCAR Weekly Series race in Irwindale.

Gray spouts Scientology praise with enthusiasm that would make the celebrity couple known as TomKat proud:

"’Dianetics’ is a book that helped me in many ways since I first read it many years ago. It helped me get better control over the obstacles I had to get through to reach goals I was passionate about. It’s a great honor to have a sponsor relationship that’s so directly related to my making it this far." (In a truly bizarre scene in March, Gray appeared at the Irwindale track with the voice of Bart Simpson, Nancy Cartwright.)

The publisher of "Dianetics" is also putting together a Web site called dianeticsracing.com.

The Jehovah’s Witnesses could not be reached for comment about any possible NASCAR sponsorship.

Wish I would’ve thought of that

Jon Stewart nailed it during this exchange with conservative prig William Bennett —

Bennett: Look, it’s a debate about whether you think marriage is between a man and a woman.

Stewart: I disagree. I think it’s a debate about whether you think gay people are part of the human condition or just a random fetish.

Numerology gone mad

Creepy stuff from the old country —

Horror film fan Suzanne Cooper yesterday named her baby Damien after the devil child in the "The Omen," who was also born on June 6.

Suzanne went one better than the movie by hitting the full Number of the Beast with the date – 6/6/06.

Special needs teacher Suzanne, 36, was also induced for six days before Damien arrived at 6:59 a.m., tipping the scales at a spine-chilling 6lb 6oz.

She said: "We are overjoyed about the baby. The Omen is one of our favourite films and that’s why I was keeping my legs crossed for a birth on the 6th.

"It does seem a bit weird I suppose, but he’s a perfect baby – nothing at all like Damien in The Omen."

Mea culpa … sort of

Finally admitting it capitulated to Chinese censors, Google offered a tortured apology Tuesday, as in "we’re sorry, but everyone’s doing it."

Google Inc. co-founder Sergey Brin acknowledged Tuesday the dominant Internet company has compromised its principles by accommodating Chinese censorship demands. He said Google is wrestling to make the deal work before deciding whether to reverse course.

Meeting with reporters near Capitol Hill, Brin said Google had agreed to the censorship demands only after Chinese authorities blocked its service in that country. Google’s rivals accommodated the same demands — which Brin described as "a set of rules that we weren’t comfortable with" — without international criticism, he said.

"We felt that perhaps we could compromise our principles but provide ultimately more information for the Chinese and be a more effective service and perhaps make more of a difference," Brin said.

Won’t someone please think about the children?

Fundamentalist tight asses in Boston have taken time out from the gay marriage debate to deal with another impending cultural crisis: queer mannequins.

See, they were right. The slope just keeps getting slicker. What’s next, a gay Ken doll?

Macy’s department store found itself mired in a fierce national debate between conservatives and gay activists when it bowed to complaints and removed part of a window display marking Boston Pride Week.

The Downtown Crossing store display featured two male mannequins – one wearing a gay pride rainbow flag around its waist – standing near a list of several planned Boston Pride events. …

But the store yanked the mannequins from the window after MassResistance, the conservative group formerly named Article 8 Alliance which has also campaigned against sex education and gay-themed books in public schools, complained the display was offensive.

"They were male mannequins with enlarged breasts, and one was wearing a skirt, said MassResistance president Brian Camenker, referring to the gay pride flag wrapped around one figure, cinched with a white belt. "It was really disgusting."

Gay imagery, in a department store? Where will the madness end?

No surprise that Macy’s bowed to pressure from the Helen Lovejoy crowd.

Elina Kazan, New York-based spokeswoman for Macy’s, said the decision to pull the dummies, but leave the rest of the display, was an effort to strike a balance.

"We believe in diversity, and our customers are very important to us," Kazan told the Herald, adding that displays supporting Pride Week in previous years did not use mannequins. "But (the display) did offend a few of our customers, and we had to reexamine it."

In other words, we believe in diversity as long as it doesn’t damage our bottom line.

Breathe in the traquility

The Aurora Austrails, captured over the South Pole Station in Antarctica

My new look

The Malcontent goes uptown. Actually, my patience was tested one time too many by Blogger. I will maintain that page for archives and such, but this is my new home. I think we’ll all be much happier here.