Mid-week blues? Fed up with work? Want to procrastinate even more than you already do?

Then ask yourself these questions as posed by Gene Weingarten, columnist and humourist from the Washington Post:

Have you noticed that, by and large, the online “Comments” to newspaper stories seem to have been written by raging lunatics? Most newspaper readers are not raging lunatics, but the loonies all seem to coalesce around the online comments. Why is this? All theories accepted here.

[source]

Read some of the amusing and not-so-amusing “theories” proffered on his blog. But if you have a theory of your own, post them here.

It goes without saying that we’ve seen some crazy comments around here and on other Australian blogs. Except I just said it. Is it the anonymity to be as ragingly lunatic as you like? To shit stir? Shock value? Or do they really believe in what they write, no matter what?

The Editor, John Surname, Jeremy Sear and Craig discuss:

* World Youth Day and World Youth Day in the media
* B. Hussein Obama on the cover of The New Yorker
* John McCain off the intertubes
* Ask A Barman
* Funniest things on the internets

** Because Ant Rogenous is at home desperately downloading the podcast recording he missed, use only the “Play in popup” link or the “Download” link. **

 

 GrodsThink 24 (15 July 08) [33:39m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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When I first saw the image of Obama and Michelle (full names not required, you know who I mean) in caricature on the cover of the latest The New Yorker magazine, with “the Illinois senator portrayed as a Muslim and bumping fists with his gun-toting, camo-wearing wife, Michelle, in the Oval Office before a portrait of Osama bin Laden, while the American flag smoulders in the fireplace”, I was, admittedly, a little taken aback.

Many Obama supporters are up in arms about it, there is a lot of chatter reverabating around the blogosphere and media outlets (both left wing and right wing). Of course, comparisons to the Danish Mohammed cartoons/outcry are being made.

The artist behind the cartoon, Barry Blitt, has defended his drawing, saying:  

I think the idea that the Obamas are branded as unpatriotic [let alone as terrorists] in certain sectors is preposterous. It seemed to me that depicting the concept would show it as the fear-mongering ridiculousness that it is.

The editor of The New Yorker, David Remnick, also defended the choice of artwork by saying:

What I think it does is hold up a mirror to the prejudice and dark imaginings about Barack Obama’s — both Obamas’ — past, and their politics. I can’t speak for anyone else’s interpretations, all I can say is that it combines a number of images that have been propagated, not by everyone on the right but by some, about Obama’s supposed “lack of patriotism” or his being “soft on terrorism” or the idiotic notion that somehow Michelle Obama is the second coming of the Weathermen or most violent Black Panthers. That somehow all this is going to come to the Oval Office.

Oh, and he’s also fully aware that The New Yorker has many times lampooned the Bush Administration, lest there should be any pro-Bush supporters out there, as I have seen in comments around the internet, bleating how they’ve seen worse from The New Yorker about the Bush White House.

The idea that we would publish a cover saying these things literally, I think, is just not in the vocabulary of what we do and who we are… We’ve run many many satirical political covers. Ask the Bush administration how many.

Anne Davies for the Sydney Morning Herald also points out: 

It is clearly The New Yorker’s wry-smile reflection on the endless internet rumours that refuse to die about the Democratic nominee despite his efforts to stomp them out: that Senator Obama is a secret Muslim and his wife is a less-than-patriotic black semi-militant.

The cover is so over the top it is hard to see it as anything other than satire and a commentary on the bigotry of a small section of the American electorate.

That is true. I can’t help but wonder, however, that it will backfire for Obama, because there are some elements so doggedly determined to convince themselves and others around them that Obama is, inter alia, a Muslim terrorist. I have no doubt that they will completely miss the satire in this cartoon and point at it as PROOF! that Obama is a Muslim terrorist. They’re desperate for him not to win the Presidency.

The Obama camp has denounced the cartoon, saying:

The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Senator Obama’s right-wing critics have tried to create. But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree.

The McCain campaign immediately sent out a press release, also calling it “tasteless and offensive”.  

One lefty blogger, Jane Hamsher, argues:

Fifteen percent of people in this country believe that Obama is a Muslim. You have to be really stupid to believe something like this, but as Roger Simon notes, it probably doesn’t encourage people to vote for him in America today.

Most people who see this cover are just going to see the image of Obama in a turban. It reinforces a critical piece of misinformation that right wing propagandists have advanced in order to poison the political climate in this country and make it that much more difficult for a person of color to be elected president. These people are really stupid in order to believe something like this, but they’re not going to get any smarter by viewing this image.

I’ve already seen a number of ridiculous comments that fail to realise the whole point of this cartoon, such as this:

Leave it to NYC to “ahem” uncover the truth about Obama. Well done. Thank you!

And another stupid comment:

BALONEY, the New Yorker cartoonist didn’t get it wrong at all. Matter of fact, they pretty much summed up what barack [sic] Hussein Obama, and his wife Michelle are all about.

Among a few things: THEY BOTH HATE AMERICA, HATE OUR FLAG, HATE OUR SYSTEM, HAVE SYMPATHIZED WITH OUR ENEMIES, WERE TETHERED 20 YEARS TO BLACK LIBERATION THEOLOGY, HAVE TOTAL AMNESIA ABOUT 9/11, WILL SURRENDER THIS COUNTRY TO ISLAMOFASCISM!

So, what do you think, readers? Was the cartoon offensive or clever satire? Even if it reinforces the negative image of Obama to some, do you think it went further than that and was racist? Made too much fuss of Obama’s ethnicity? What about Michelle being a Black Panther revolutionary? What about the comparisons made to the Danish cartoons uproar — or is it a different situation altogether?

If you’re going to be a successful competitive eater then you might as well have a kewl name.

Hi, I’m Joey Chestnut. I’m here to help.

US defending champion Joey Chestnut won the annual Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest overnight by downing 64 hot dogs in a competition that stretched into a first-ever overtime.

Mr Chestnut, of San Jose, California, defeated six-time champion Takeru Kobayashi of Japan in the annual event held at New York’s Coney Island beach.

The two were tied at 59 hot dogs a piece at the end of the regulation 10 minutes, forcing a sudden death overtime to determine which man could eat five more hot dogs in the shortest time.

(source)

Competitive eating is serious stuff; anyone who doubts me should rent out Taxidermia. The training regime practiced by Mr Chestnut is different to that depicted in the film but is still pretty extreme.

Chestnut trains by fasting and by stretching his stomach with milk and water. Three days before winning a chicken-eating contest in Boston, in November 2005, Chestnut drank gallons of water in under one minute and ate buffalo wings to get his stomach accustomed to them. As of July 4, 2006, his competition weight was 220 pounds (100 kg).

Hot dogs are the mainstay of competitive eating in the USA but the sheer range of foods that JoChe (as he’s know to his close friends) has scoffed to win titles is impressive, and pretty bloody funny (and a study in the shitness of American food.) Check out some of these:

* Grilled cheese sandwiches
* Pork ribs
* Deep fried asparagus
* Pizza Hut special items
* Pulled pork (not in any way related to interference with farm animals before their slaughter for food)
* Horseshoe sandwiches

What are horseshoe sandwiches? I’m glad you asked.

Heart attack on a plate

The horseshoe sandwich originated in Springfield, Illinois. This open-faced sandwich begins with thick-sliced toasted sourdough bread, and a couple of hamburger patties or ham. The meat is topped with french fries and smothered with a “secret” cheese sauce. With its many variations, it is a local favorite not often found outside Central Illinois.

Many people would laugh at Joey Chestnut’s achievements and mock his sport, but here at GrodsCorp we’d like to salute Joey Chestnut: a true sporting hero.

Joey Chestnut fights his gag reflex while smoking a sausage

The Internet is a sublime creation: I learn something from it every day. Today I learned about octopus sex:

A man whose self-esteem is so low he identifies himself as a beast has admitted to downloading images showing sexual acts with an octopus.

Rodney Scott McLagan, 48, of South Arm, was caught with 31,000 images and video files involving sexual acts with children, dogs, ponies, snakes, tigers and an octopus.

What. The. Fuck. Octopuses?! How the hell do you screw one in the first place? Or do you let it do you, eight times over? What type of malevolent sicko engages in such an act?

Curiosity got the better of me and, shame of shame, I went a-Googling. And what do you know… there’s an entire Japanese sub-culture dedicated to sexual congress between humans and cephalopods. According to Wykypedya:

Tentacled creatures appeared in Japanese erotica long before animated pornography; among the most famous of the early instances (and perhaps the first) is a Hokusai woodcut called The Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife, depicting a woman sexually entwined with a pair of octopuses.

Most unnervingly, last night we had calamari for dinner. I just hope none of these freaks got their hands on it - or anything else - before it hit the frypan.

“I know what cricket is — you throw a ball and then you hit it with a paddle.”

 (source)

The Editor, John Surname, Ant Rogenous, Jeremy Sear and Craig discuss:

* Nukes
* Hybrid cars
* Dagwood dogs
* Fashion and dress codes in education
* Nudity and the fall of the Roman Empire
* Lesbians

** Because Jeremy Sear’s new copy of Windows Vista has crashed again, use only the “Play in popup” link or the “Download” link. **

 

 GrodsThink 20 (10 June 08) [31:20m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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The Editor, John Surname, Ant Rogenous, Jeremy Sear and Billybob discuss:

* Religious intolerance in Camden
* Kevin Rudd’s “butler” and work ethic
* Amazonian lost tribes
* Campayn to modernis Inglish speling
* Andrew Landeryou

** Because Craig is on the internet at home even though he told us he was sick, use only the “Play in popup” link or the “Download” link. **

 

 GrodsThink 19 (3 June 08) [34:01m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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This is just simply beyond hilarious. Words fail.

(Cheers, Wah!)

UPDATE: Need subtitles?

There’s no better advertisement for an Australian republic than wizened old wogboy Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (whom, it should be noted, Edinburghians hold no particular affection for). Every time Big Phil opens his wrinkly lips, little bits of sour Edwardian elitism fly out, like venom from a senile old cobra:

Jamie Durie, the designer of the … Australian Garden at the [Chelsea Flower] show … had been showing the Duke around the showpiece when he put his royal visitor right. “It was my first experience of Prince Philip. He said to me, ‘I do like your tree fern’. I said, ‘Actually, it’s not a tree fern, it’s a member of the Cycad family. It’s a Macrozamia moorei’. With that, he walked off. “I didn’t want a bloody lecture,” Prince Philip was heard to mutter.

Sucks to be wrong, Phil, but I guess it must smart - especially when you’ve had a lifetime of constantly being told you’re right. Not his silliest remark by a long stretch though, having noted - shortly after the Dunblane school shootings - that guns are no more dangerous than cricket bats. And that he’d like to be reincarnated as a virus in order to solve the world’s overpopulation. And any number of similarly racist, bigoted and offensive comments.

The Happy Partisan reports the initial action.

GrodsCorp reports the reciprocal action.

Half of me wants to watch the multimedia and the other half doesn’t.

The Editor, John Surname, Jeremy Sear, Keri, Chuck A. Spear and Craig discuss:

* Teh gays
* Cab driver and teacher strikes
* Austrian hostages in basements
* SBS hidden cameras
* Ronaldo’s man-whore problem
* Bill Heffernan vs. Justice Kirby in the GrodsThink naked cagefight

** Because Ant Rogenous is using all the bandwidth to download instructional Fleshlight videos use only the “Play in popup” link or the “Download” link. **

 

 GrodsThink 15 (6 May 2008) [32:01m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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Say what you like about compulsory voting (and for the record I’m pro), but when less than half of the voters of London bother to vote for the person they want to govern seven million people with a multi-billion pound budget for the next four years then you can’t help but conclude that “I don’t give a fuck”, rather than Boris Johnson, was the winner on the day.

The Editor notes: A huge welcome back to jLo who is briefly returning from a long, self-imposed GrodsExile.
____________________

I love to vote. Apparently, however, I need to stop doing it: my vote is a jinx that sees the forces of evil triumph. My 18th birthday party was significant not because I finally got to get legally drunk, but because it was the night John Howard came to power. 11 long years it took for him to be unseated, and I mourn the fact that I was not in the country to celebrate with my long-suffering friends the night it happened.

Now, I am dealt a further blow. Not only did I miss the greatest electoral night in Australia of my adult life to date, but my FIRST LONDON ELECTION has turned out to be a bitter disappointment. Commonweatlh residents of London are entitled to have their say in local council/Mayoral elections, and so I dutifully turned up at Shoreditch Town Hall yesterday morning to cast my vote (three jurisdictions in six months, in case anyone else but me has noticed). Tonight the counting is over and apparently Boris Johnson is my new Mayor.

What the fuck.

It’s my 18th birthday all over again.

You all know how I feel about this city. I love it to pieces, and can never explain exactly why. Well, my job just got harder, because of the measly 45% of my fellow Londoners who could be bothered turning up to vote, a staggering number of them thought that it would be a good idea for Boris Johnson to be the mayor. That racist, homophobic muppet with stupid hair is now in charge of one of the greatest cities in the world. You have got to be kidding.

It’s nights like this that make me lost my faith in democracy. What the fuck are you all thinking? Are you NUTS? I am very privileged in many ways, and I try to never lose sight of that. But when I see other adults make such FUCKED UP choices, my political minority status is very difficult to resolve.

End drunken rant. Goodnight.

PS. Perhaps I should refrain from voting in the US general election? God help us if my jinx continues.

School sets low targets for student scores to ensure that targets are met.

“The modified course only needs to contain one assessment task (maybe the easiest one). The student only needs to get 50 per cent to get an SA (satisfactory achievement) or 15 per cent to get an RA (recorded achievement). It’s that easy!”

President sets low target for reducing carbon emissions to ensure that target is met.

Mr Bush has unveiled a plan to halt the growth of US emissions by 2025…