There are two types of foods in this world: non-elite and elite. The non-elite types include things like hamburgers, steaks, tomato sauce, instant coffee and processed cheese. The elite types include things like chardonnay, lattes and… Dijon mustard.

Another sign that President Obama is an elitist Muslim terrorist: The President ordered a cheeseburger with Dijon mustard. “What kind of man orders a cheeseburger without ketchup but Dijon mustard?” asked Laura Ingraham after the president’s visit to an Arlington, Virginia burger joint with Vice President Joe Biden. Sean Hannity played a Grey Poupon commercial and said “I hope you enjoyed that fancy burger, Mr. President.” Mark Steyn, filling in for Rush Limbaugh, said Obama was trying “to enlighten us” through his order. The blog Gateway Pundit wrote “They’re just two ordinary metrosexual guys going out for a burger.”

Ladies and gentlemen, a new phrase: The Dijon Left.

(Thanks to reader jLo.)

I knew it! Those Obama-is-a-Mooooooslem nutters at A Western Heart aren’t nutters, and Andrew “Al Gore is fat” Bolt’s rantings aren’t rantings. US President Barack Obama and former Vice President Al Gore are both knowingly profiting from the swine flu outbreak that isn’t an accident of nature but is actually a bio-terrorism attack.

The latest bioterrorism attack by the New World Order is likely a beta test. Yes, it is a bioterrorism attack. It was a hybrid strain created from human, swine, and bird flu from North America, Europe, and Asia. It was created in a laboratory. This doesn’t happen in nature.

[...]

You might want to question who is making a profit on this as well. Barack Obama, Al Gore, and Donald Rumsfeld all own shares of the company who makes the Tamiflu drug to treat this virus.

Apparently swine flu is an effort by the “ruling elite” to reduce the world’s population. It is by the same people who put flouride in your water “causing your brain, liver, and bones to rot and decay” because “the government hates you and wants to kill you”.

You heard it here first.

From the G20 a few days ago. But look at that opportunist Berlusconi! He’s got plenty of chutzpah.

So, caption time. Go for it.

(Back: US President Barack Obama, Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev; front: Chinese President Hu Jintao)

An expat Australian’s perspective on Kevin Rudd’s meeting with Barack Obama.

The [cultural] cringe expresses itself in many ways – parochialism, bravado, humor – but at the root of it is an often unspoken embarrassment about our place in the world order. We act indifferent to other nations’ views of us and claim that we’re “the best country on earth” (yep, it’s not just Americans who say that). Yet deep down, we’re desperate for the affirmation of powerful friends.

Go read the whole thing.

“So, B-man, I says to them, ‘don’t throw the fair go out the back door,’ and the suckers bought it.”

Andrew Bolt thought that US President Barack Obama’s gift of 25 DVDs to UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown was a diplomatic faux pas because Brown is blind in one eye, but it was actually a balls-up because the DVDs are encoded with the wrong region code.

It occurred to us recently that the British PM might not even be able to enjoy the thoughtful and luxurious gift of 25 American DVDs given to him by President Obama… Now, just in case they weren’t upset enough already, the British press confirms our worst fears…

Newspaper of choice for the average British fascist, the Daily Mail, has been having conniptions in the wake of Gordon Brown’s visit to the US. Apparently the PM gave Barack Obama some snazzy gifts, among them a penholder carved from the timber of some old-timey anti-slave ship and a multi-volume biography of that old soak Winston Churchill. And what did Obama give Gordon in return? A set of 25 classic Hollywood moofies on DVD, including The Wizard of Oz and Singin’ in the Rain.

Pretty frickin’ cheap coming from the chief executive of the world’s largest economy. Not that Dubya was much better: when Brown visited him in 2007, Bush’s gift was a bomber jacket. And Brown seems about as likely to don a bomber jacket as he is to slip on a full-body condom.

What would you give the British PM if you were picking the White House’s diplomatic sweeteners? The pretzel that almost choked George W. Bush? The DNA scrapings from Monica’s frock? One of Abraham Lincoln’s old Fleshlights?

I’ve just been reading this article in the New York Times about this precocious little darling:

Meet Jonathan Krohn, a 14-year old “news media darling and the conservative movement’s underage graybeard at last weekend’s Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington.” Check out his over-eager and corporatised performance at CPAC last week.

As I was reading this article, the most obvious thing to jump out was just how small Jonathan’s world is, even at 14 years of age. It appears his life is limited to a Christian-based viewpoint: home-schooling by his parents (his Jewish mother became a Baptist decades ago), attending a middle-school for five hours a week with only 10 other students where classes are taught from a Christian perspective, and an “acting career” performing in Christian Youth Theater plays and regional shows. He has also earned money from writing and performing on a syndicated radio Bible show for children. He and his family are active members of Peachtree Corners Baptist Church in Norcross, Georgia.

Apparently he is so “passionate” about conservatism that he has written and published an 86-page book, Define Conservatism which outlines what he reckons are the movement’s core values.  (Do check out his blog as well — it’s full of all the usual crazy blathering talking points you hear from Rush Limbough.) He contacted the organisers of CPAC for a spot to talk to like-minded people (and promote his book). Preaching to the converted, so to speak. There’s no suggestion anywhere — in this article, on his website — that he has ever mixed with non-conservatives or non-Christians. And yet he’s already denounced “liberalism” as if it’s a really terrible thing. President Obama is clearly a socialist because of his policies! Straight from the mouths of right-wing shock jocks.

He also appears to be developing quite a healthy ego:

Why just that morning, his mother, Marla Krohn, marveled, a staff member for a potential candidate for Georgia governor asked for a meeting with Jonathan. In her gentle drawl, Mrs. Krohn said cautiously, “I’m not sure I’m a supporter of his.”

“Neither am I,” Jonathan piped in.

“But I’m a voter,” Mrs. Krohn reminded him firmly.

Jonathan retorted, “Now that I’m a political pundit, I have the ability to influence people. I have to think about it!”

I just have to wonder — is his world always going to be so one-eyed and narrow-minded? It’s disturbing that at 14 years of age, he’s already so rigid and uncompromising. And that is incredibly sad, for kids should be learning and exploring with an open mind. (I’m now wondering how many conservatives are reading this and thinking the same thing about “liberals”.)

At any rate, this 14-year old unwittingly provides a good giggle:

He still has the zeal of a missionary. His voice rising to a wobbly squeak, he grabs any opening to press the cause. “Barack Obama is the most left-wing president in my lifetime,” he said.

Well. America has a new President — President Barack Obama. How do you like that, Aryans, Blairites and other assorted right-wingers?!

Bush is gone, at last. And Cheney… well, he’s gone home too.

Anyway, as I’m sure some of you can imagine, I was up at 3am to watch the Inauguration the other night (as were Wah and Tobias Ziegler and a couple of friends I caught stumbling around on Facebook) (oh, and some guy called tim who seemed to be in a bit of a snit about the whole thing).

When I first heard that Rick Warren was going to do the invocation, my reaction was less-than-complimentary. I simply have no tolerance for Christian fundamentalists (no more than I do for fundamentalists of any religion). I thought he would use the occasion to push his Christian Right agenda somehow and taint the occasion.

Well, Warren’s invocation turned out to be a little surprising. Even some of his fiercest critics in the gay and lesbian community spoke afterwards about perhaps a more open dialogue between evangelists — or at least with Rick Warren himself — and gays and lesbians. His quoting of the Sh’ma (”Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God. The Lord is One”) and calling God “the compassionate and merciful one”, which is a phrase from a Muslim devotion, certainly went some way to be inclusive rather than exclusive. Even President Obama’s speech contained, for the first time, not just “Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus” but non-believers as well. (How do you non-believers feel about that? I want to know.)

Still, for all their mention of “others”, it would have been nice to have a Rabbi or an Imam or a Zororastrian priest or a Mahasiddha somewhere, rather than having a Christian-dominated invocation and benediction and blessings at the luncheon. Do I need to point out that America is not a Christian nation? (Well, yeah, because there are people who erroneously claim it is.)

Anyway, moving on. What the hell was Aretha Franklin wearing on her head? And the poetry recital? Why? (Disclaimer: I am not a fan of poetry, especially poetry recitals.)

Oh, and hey! How about Obama flubbing his lines during the oath?! Only it wasn’t so much his fault as it was the Chief Justice. The CHIEF JUSTICE! Defender of the Constitution! Chief Justice, defender of the Constitution couldn’t even get the oath right!

Of course, after tim admitted he was wrong in initially screeching that Obama fucked it up, he still had to say this:  

It was my mistake to think it was Obama’s mistake. Also, that oath error may have influenced Obama’s subsequent speech.

Tobias Ziegler, in a Gmail chat, interpreted tim’s comment as:

I fucked up. But he fucked up worse.

Anyway, it doesn’t change a thing (sorry, h8ers), but to be “safe”, Chief Justice John Roberts has re-administered the oath in the Map Room of the White House. This time, Roberts and Obama got it perfect.

And now, I reckon we all on Teh Left should heed Dave from Albury’s post on the best thing about President Obama:

I’m really looking forward to the first bile fuelled screed about the Obama administration so that I can get on my high horse and cheerfully ask “Why does the right hate America?”. I have a feeling that it’s not going to get old any time soon.

Bring it on.

The US election came and went, and now it’s time to laugh ourselves stupid at those who predicted an overwhelming win for McCain.

Political Lizard:

So sa (sic) we start this election We (sic) see that Obama starts off with approximately 36.8 million votes and McCain starts with 36.6 million votes. This is a 200,000 vote lead prior to independents being included. If these voters are evenly split We (sic) could have a situation where one candidate wins the popular vote and another wins the electoral college. A split in independents favors McCain. If McCain maintains his slight lead among independent (sic) he wins similar to 2004.

ChronWatch:

Obama’s biggest problem is that the majority of Americans racially are white. Even Hispanics, racially, are white. Once you get by all the usual politically correct blather about race, the likelihood that whites will vote for Obama is slim to none when they get in the privacy of the voting booth.

That is why John McCain, unless he selects a serial killer as his vice president running mate, is likely to be the next President of the United States of America.

When queeried (sic) on what he meant by this, the intrepid poster expanded upon this thesis:

The vast majority of homosexuals are atheist and liberal. That is a
fact. Also journalism is a favorite career path of homosexuals and
socialists.
Journalists are like lawyers. They create their own job via paper and
bullshit. Both are human barnacles on society that produce nothing of value.

Edward David Gil (cached, original deleted):

Here is how “the penny dropped” and I suddenly realized that McCain will beat Obama decisively in this November’s presidential election (as unlikely as it may seem now in July): it was when I read that the city of Denver has been giving the Democratic National Committee’s “Host Committee” members a pass on the city’s tax on gasoline for about four months, before it was disclosed.

Daily AntiKos

Reasons why:
1. Conservatives don’t participate in polls.
2. People have felt intimidated into saying they’re supporting Obama.
3. Sarah Palin will produce a turnout of the base as never seen before.
4. Coal states have shifted toward McCain.
5. God is conservative.

Owned. Every last one.

In honour of the many back-country, Francophone and/or anthropomorphic conservatives out there in blogland, here’s a cajun-fried takedown of Hussein Obama X. You’ll remember that he made history this week as the man who “racist black voters” (sic) propelled into le Bureau Ovale. Sometimes, even sizzling, right-of-centre zydeco can’t hold back the change that has to come. But if you can’t beat them, you might as well dance, non? Take it away, mes amis.

As for me, I’ll be spending the weekend toasting democracy with some more (possibly French) bubbly. Formidable!

By most accounts, yesterday was an inspiring, world-changing moment. Of course, the election of Barack Obama as President means a lot because of who he is, but in getting there, he also appears to have redrawn America’s political map.

Many conservatives – including Tim Blair – managed to be gracious in the face of this historic shift. Even John McCain – who was utterly thrashed – was able to make a pretty moving speech that acknowledged the importance of Obama’s victory. Fair play to all of them.

But you may be asking yourselves: on such an auspicious day, is there any way for an Australian conservative to turn this into an attack on the filthy habits of teh left? Could the election of Obama possibly be tarnished by associating it with something eee-vil? Come on down, Miranda Devine.

Barack Obama’s autobiography, Dreams From My Father, describes his flirtation with drugs during a troubled early period. “Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow [cocaine] when you could afford it … Everybody was welcome into the club of disaffection.” At 47, the US president-elect is typical of his late baby boomer-early generation X cohort, in that marijuana was freely available in his teens and early 20s, virtually unpoliced and regarded as relatively harmless, a “soft” drug.

Oh noes! Snoop Dogg has been elected President! What can it all mean?

As the pot-smoking generations have moved en masse into positions of power, the days when reporters could play gotcha journalism with politicians about previous drug use are over.

Oh noes! The bong-zombies are in charge of the crack-house! And there’s nothing that our totally clean-living Fourth Estate can do to save us! What can it all mean?

While marijuana use may have lost much of its political sting, politicians should… heed mounting evidence that marijuana is not the benign drug it was once thought. If anything, their experience gives them the moral authority to ensure young people, particularly adolescents, with their exquisitely vulnerable brains, understand that cannabis is increasingly linked to permanent psychiatric damage.

So, politicians need to be straight up with the kids: “Marijuana is a gateway drug that can lead to other things, like being the President of the United States or Leader of the Parliamentary Liberal Party. But if you Just Say No, you can dream instead of writing bizarre, obsessive, mean-spirited and irrelevant newspaper columns”.

Of course, that message is unlikely to come loud and clear from psychotic Gen X weedheads like the POTUS-elect.

But for those aged over 40, cannabis use increased, especially among the over-50s, reflecting the ageing of the pothead generation. It is this generation, now in positions of influence, who are proving dangerously resistant to changing their youthful notions about cannabis.

As they’re having their breakfast buckets on the first dawn of this new era, the Obamas should have a good read of Miranda’s column. They will, like, totally piss themselves, dude.

I have a confession to make and I don’t want you to get angry at me, or feel betrayed, or reel back in horror, or send me away to the Worker’s Paradise of Siberia for “re-education”, or anything like that.

I’ve always like George W. Bush. And I’m going to miss him when he leaves the White House to make room for Barack Obama, who will win tomorrow.

Okay, I hated Dubya for his war “policies”, Guantanamo Bay, Dick Cheney, his so-called “faith-based initiatives”, his indifference to his own citizens who struggled daily for basic rights like health and education, and so on.

But I sure as hell loved his horribly mangled grammar, his ability to say some of the most stupid things that does not befit the President of the United States, and his lack of embarrassment — or complete unwareness — at what he’d said.

I’ve cringed and sniggered and often laughed out loud at Dubya’s bloopers. I’ve watched The Letterman Show whenever I could just for the “Great Moments in Presidential Speeches” segment.

So, with his impending departure from the White House, I’d like to take a look back at some of my favourite things he’s said in the last 7-8 years, for posterity (and in no particular order, there was a lot to sift through). The quotes are from the excellent DubyaSpeak.com website, who have done an amazing job “recording the damage” over the years.

• I can press when there needs to be pressed. I can hold hands when there needs to be — hold hands. — January 6, 2008
• I know what I believe. I will continue to articulate what I believe and what I believe – I believe what I believe is right. — July 22, 2001
• It is naive and dangerous to take a policy that he suggested the other day, which is to have bilatarelations with North Korea. — October 8, 2004
• I don’t like to put words in leaders’ mouths. I don’t particularly like it when people put words in my mouth, either, by the way, unless I say it. — November 10, 2007
• It reads like a mystery, a novel. It’s well written. — July 26, 2004 (pertaining to the 9/11 Commission’s report)
• She is a fabulous First Lady. I was a lucky man when she said, yes, I agree to marry you. I love her dearly, and I’m proud of the job she’s doing on behalf of all Americans. Just like I love my brother. — September 9, 2003
• The Ambassador and the General were briefing me on the — the vast majority of Iraqis want to live in a peaceful, free world. And we will find these people and we will bring them to justice. — October 27, 2003
• You know, I’m — I’ve been in politics long enough to know that polls just go poof at times. — April 19, 2007
• That’s George Washington, the first president, of course. The interesting thing about him is that I read three — three or four books about him last year. Isn’t that interesting? — May 5, 2006
• It’s a myth to think I don’t know what’s going on. And it’s a myth to think that I’m not aware that there is opinions that don’t agree with mine. Because I’m fully aware of that. …I see a lot of the news. Every morning I look at the newspaper I can tell you what the headlines are. I must confess, if I think the story is, like, not a fair appraisal, I’ll move on. — December 12, 2005
• I want to thank my friend, Senator Bill Frist, for joining us today. You’re doing a heck of a job. You cut your teeth here, right? That’s where you started practicing? That’s good. He married a Texas girl, I want you to know. Karyn is with us. A West Texas girl, just like me. — May 27, 2004
• I love the story of America, I love the fact that people who started with nothing and have built a fantastic food processing business. — October 14, 2003
• There’s no need for any unrestrained yelling. — July 30, 2003
• REPORTER: Do you think you would be able to work effectively with a future Australian leader, be it either a successor of Mr. Howard from his own party, or from their opposition?
  DUBYA: Well, I suspect he’s going to outlast me, so that is a moot point. Probably a question you ought to ask him. Somebody said, you and John Howard appear to be so close, don’t you have any differences? And I said, yes, he doesn’t have any hair. — May 16, 2006
• We can help somebody who hurts by hugging a neighbor in need. — April 4, 2003
• First we talked about the bridge that collapsed. I was here earlier, saw the collapse first hand. I was impressed by the magnitude of the problem. It was — my heart was touched by the fact that people lost their lives. — August 21, 2007
• We have overcome a recession. That means things are going backwards. — March 26, 2004
• Rarely is the question asked, are, is our children learning? — January 11, 2000
• I’m the master of low expectations. — June 4, 2003
  
• Nobody has accused me of having a real sophisticated vocabulary. — October 11, 2006

Feel free to add your favourite Dubya quotes, as we begin to farewell Dubya with joy.