Dumbing down

Unfortunately, I see masses of dumb people heading to the polls on November 4th and voting for the wrong presidential candidate and his equally wrong vice-presidential candidate.

From CNN.com:

"Only Palin can save McCain, her party, and the country she loves. She can bow out for personal reasons ... Do it for your country," conservative columnist and former Palin fan Kathleen Parker of Nationalreview.com pleaded on Friday.

In defense, Republicans say the complaints are coming from "intellectual" conservatives -- not Main Street Republicans, who they insist love the "hockey mom," from Alaska, as Palin describes herself.

"These are the folks that really have responded to the candidacy of a McCain-Palin ticket. These are the folks that are showing up in huge numbers, tens of thousands, to the rallies," Leslie Sanchez, a CNN political contributor, said.

First of all, "intellectual conservative" is an oxymoron.

(Sorry. I had to get that out of my system.)

Second, that bolded statement shows both great strategic insight and a depressing realization: The Republicans do a great job of dumbing things down to reach their armless constituents. There are people out there who blindly pick a candidate simply because of the ticket or banner they run under, even if the candidate's policies end up putting them at a disadvantage.

The fact that this is even the case, that some people are so uninformed, with no reason or desire to become informed, that they will actually vote for a person, a party, or an ideology that limits or even oppresses them, is truly depressing and discouraging.

My wife, a staunch proponent of women's rights, argues that no woman should ever vote for a conservative candidate, as it's basically a vote against self-interest. The thought of a woman deciding for herself what her life should be like is just too much for conservatives to process.

She's right. But it's that blinding tie to ideology that continues this cycle.

Ideology is a heavy weight to shake once you have it. As my old professor, Dr. Bill Thompson once said, "Gang, ideology will get you killed."

He also said that "65 percent of the U.S. population has shit for brains."

Let's hope the masses forget to vote on Nov. 4.

Time to make the Jihad Donuts

I'm not ashamed to admit that I vote Democrat and that I generally follow liberal theory lines. I can also admit that there are a few conservative ideals that make sense to me (though I cannot think of any at the moment).

Both liberals and conservatives supply plenty of WTF moments -- but you have to admit that the scale is tipped heavily toward the Right. Pre-Subway Jared Fogle heavily .

This story isn't helping to ease that weight.

Dunkin Donuts, the greatest donut place on Earth, has removed a TV ad featuring cooking maven Rachael Ray at the implied behest of conservative viewers, led by Ann Coulter-wannabe and O'Reilly Factor guest host, Michelle Malkin.

What could anyone possibly find wrong in a Dunkin Donuts ad?

A scarf.

Yes. A scarf.

There was no jelly on the scarf, no boston creme or custard, not even some powerded sugar. Apparently, what Ms. Malkin saw sprinkled on the scarf was a few dashes of Al-Qaeda with a hint of explosives.

Really. Read this:

Dunkin Donuts has pulled a commercial featuring pitchwoman Rachael Ray wearing a scarf because Michelle Malkin and other conservative observers thought the scarf looked too much like a keffiyeh, what Malkin describes as "the traditional scarf of Arab men that has come to symbolize murderous Palestinian jihad."

I can't make this stuff up, folks. Here's the visual evidence:



Ms. Malkin applauded Dunkin Donuts decision to pull the ad thusly:

It's refreshing to see an American company show sensitivity to the concerns of Americans opposed to Islamic jihad and its apologists. Too many of them bend over backward in the direction of anti-American political correctness....

Was there nothing else going on in the world that was more important than a clearly unintentional wardrobe choice?

Well, actually there was...but why would anyone care about a former White House press secretary who states what many people knew all along -- that George W. Bush is a stubborn blowhard who basically lied to the American public and the rest of the world in his justification for invading Iraq.

But I digress.

So Dunkin Donuts pulled the ad for fear of being betrayed as promoting terrorist-sponsored donuts.

I can't believe I just wrote that sentence.

Somewhere, the owners of Krispy Kreme are looking at their bank accounts and laughing their pastry-filled faces off.