Dennis the Peasant

Personally, I'm Picking The One From Column 'A'...

Here's an interesting headline from Huffington Post:

GOP Still Filibustering Sebelius Desptie Flu Outbreak

This means that either...

a) Huffington Post writers really think Huffington Post readers are silly enough to believe that career politician and tax brainiac Kathy Sebelius being unable to helm the Department of Health and Human Services at the present time will somehow hinder the United States government's response to the swine flu outbreak,

Or...

b) Huffington Post writers are really worried about the health and well-being of Republican senators participating in the Sebelius filibuster, and think Huffington Post readers should be too. 

Yet Another Great Moment In Principled Femnism From Our "Great Moments In Principled Femnism" Series...

From (Jessica "Not-Quite White Wedding Dress" Valenti's) Feministing, no less...

Ask Professor Foxy: How Do I Deal With My Partner's Low Sex Drive?

This one's a hummer, kids, so hold on tight.

Feministing's very own advice columnist, Professor Foxy, furrows her brow over the issue of differing sex drives amongst partners. Take these two tales of woe, for example...

"Out of Batteries Again" (ugh!) writes:

My partner of four years doesn't have as high of a sex drive as me. I would enjoy having sex every day, but he has never cared to do it more than once every few weeks, even in the best of times.

And "Lesbian Death Bed" writes:

I need advice! I am in a committed lesbian relationship with my girlfriend. We went from having sex for a couple of hours a day in the beginning of our relationship to now a few months later I am lucky if her and I have sex once a week.

Now, me being me, I thought what I'd hear out of an committed femnist advice columnist would be something along the lines of this:

Hey, deal with it. Femnism is founded on the notion that all persons (and especially womyn) have an inalienable right to control their own bodies. If your partner doesn't want to have sex, that is their right... And you have absolutely no right to question that decision.

At least that's the line that's always been directed at me - your basic drenched-in-male-privilege, patriarchy-embracing, insensitive, brutish male - by every femnist I've ever met (or read). But evidently, I've been mistaken all these years!

Per Professor Foxy:

While we should not force our partners to have sex (ever), we should expect them to compromise.

What the fuck? Compromise? Compromise? Either you want to have sex with your partner or you do not. Period. There is nothing to compromise about!!!

The good professor seems to be dimly aware of the problem here, as she throws in this line to cover her tracks, although I'm not sure she wrote what she meant:

Incompatible sex drives are especially difficult for feminists: where is the line between pressuring partners and compromising ourselves?

Again; there is no "line" to cross on this issue: Either you're pressuring your partner for sex or you are not. You can call it anything you want - like "trying to work out a compromise" or something similar - but the bottom line is you're working to get someone who doesn't want to have sex with you to surrender their bodies to you so you can have sex with them.

So, evidently, what all this femnist sex drive angst (which sounds suspiciously like angst about femnist sex drives) boils down to is this:

When folks like you and I get a bit horny and try to get some, we're brutish rapists... Mindless fucking machines that care not for the feelings of our marital partners, because, after all, The Whole Patriarchy Thingy demands that the womyn we married service us on demand.

Whereas...

If you're a femnist, and you can't get your dumb ass the sex you want, you get your significant other to "compromise" - meaning you get the sex your partner really didn't want to have in the first place -  and you're still a sensitive, principled femnist who is dedicated to overthrowing The Patriarchy. 

Why?

Who the Hell knows. That's just the Way It Is.

Sometimes, A Comment Isn't Necessary...

 From a recent featured post at DailyKOS:

As one of the original 2255 members of the Daily Kos, I think I'm in as good a position as anyone to say that Barack Obama's presidency is off to the greatest start of any presidency in the site's history.

Only 97 days into his term, it's already clear that Obama is the hippest, red hottest, most photogenic/telegenic President that this country has had since color film was invented.

I can hardly wait to see what develops over the next 3 days.

 

How Many Femnists Does It Take To Fuck Up A Femnist Wedding?

This is an absolute classic from everybody's favorite dim-bulb femnist, Amanda Marcotte:

Kate Harding and Jessica Valenti both have pieces up defending themselves for marrying, and about the difficulties of crafting a feminist wedding, which are apparently the same exact problems trying to craft an individualistic wedding, which is a mandate that comes down on people just as hard as the one to conform, which creates the industry of everyone copying everyone else’s cute unique touches.*

*For instance, the first time I heard about a “unique” father/daughter dance that involves hilariously breaking from a slow dance to a fast one, I laughed and thought that was actually pretty unique, but a quick perusal of YouTube shows that whoever thought of it first has seen the practice sweep the nation. It’s adorable, of course, but falls short of the individuality mark.

(64 words, not including the 65 word end note.)

It comes from this Amanduh Post over at Pandagon.

First of all, before punishing yourself with a whack of Amanduh Prose, go read the pieces by Amanda's fellow femnist dim-bulbs Kate Harding and Jessica Valenti. Just make sure you don't have any liquid in your mouth, because I can confidently guarantee you it will be on your monitor before you can finish either of these brainfarts.

What's doubly wonderful about Harding and Valenti is (a) just how quickly they ditch their femnist principles when those same principles get in the way of what they want, and (b) just how abjectly silly their rationalizations for said ditching of principles actually are to us sane folk.

Here's some of their nonsense that tickled me the most:

From Valenti...

As I grew up and began identifying myself as a feminist, there were plenty of issues that continued to make me question marriage: the father "giving" the bride away, women taking their husband's last name, the white dress, the vows promising to "obey" the groom. And that only covers the wedding. Once you get married, women are still implicitly expected to do the majority of the housework and take care of any future children...

But never underestimate the power of being in love. Andrew is fabulous and I want to be married to him - due in no small part to the fact that he also identifies himself as a feminist and that an equal partnership is just as important to him as it is to me. So when we decided to get married, we talked about the traditions to avoid (white dress), what to incorporate (both parents walking us both down the aisle) and, of course, how to plan the wedding...

As founder of the website feministing.com, I have written online about everything from vibrators to the form of birth control I use, but I had been worried about blogging about our engagement. When you address personal issues, especially those so fraught with politics, you are sure to cause a stir.

Emboldened, I blogged again - this time about the ways I was incorporating feminism into the wedding. I wrote about keeping my last name and buying a not-quite white dress from a store that gives all the money to charity. I blogged about the struggle Andrew and I had getting engaged in the same month that California overturned same-sex marriage rights. We had actually discussed not getting married until everyone could; instead, we decided to use our impending marriage as a way to talk about same-sex marriage among our friends and family.

And from Harding...

So, boy, do I ever empathize with Jessica Valenti's piece in the Guardian today about trying to plan a feminist wedding. I thought I already had planned one -- in less than a day, even -- but now here I am talking about color schemes, having an ivory silk dress made (I got married in black), and traveling 400 miles to taste mini quiches.

Whether it comes from the right or left, from men or other women, the bulk of the criticism essentially amounts to the same thing: "Ain't no such thing as a feminist wedding, lady. Nice try."

And, you know, there's more than a little truth in that. While Valenti and I and our respective menfolk have made a lot of similar gestures toward having less screamingly anti-feminist wedding celebrations, at the very least -- e.g., skipping any paternal delivery of bride to groom, keeping our names, encouraging guests who ask about gifts to donate to a charity working toward marriage equality -- I know I've already capitulated to tradition a whole lot more than I expected to. I was planning to wear a blue dress for the reception, but then, all of a sudden, nearly white sounded kinda good. I started out with a "Screw etiquette -- it's not like our friends and fam would buy any pretense to elegance from us anyway" attitude, only to lose it when I realized I'd had envelopes printed up with both abbreviations and spelled-out words in the return address. When my dad offered a contribution to the party fund, my husband immediately balked -- and I immediately went, "I'm sorry, are you really suggesting we turn down free money just so we don't have to feel beholden to my father and/or harken back to a tradition in which I'm basically a piece of property changing hands? Because I really don't think you're focusing enough on the free money part."

Why bother with the whole mess, then? Isn't the most feminist solution not to get married at all? Well, sure. "But never underestimate the power of being in love," Valenti writes. "Andrew is fabulous and I want to be married to him -- due in no small part to the fact that he also identifies himself as a feminist and that an equal partnership is just as important to him as it is to me." That's just it. Though plenty of people choose never to marry -- and more power to 'em -- a lot of us just plain want to be married to the people we love.

You can argue that that desire issues mostly from a patriarchal culture constantly shoving its heteronormative values down our throats and ... well, I'll back you up on that, actually. But for a lot of us, even feminists, it's still there and still powerful -- both the desire to get married and the desire to throw a big effin' party to celebrate.

Of course, Amanda has a few thoughts on all this in the post linked above, but since this is not This Week's Amanda Sentence, I'll just leave it to you to mine that vein. It is worth noting that Amanda manages to find a way to cut Harding and Valenti slack for their patriarchal indulgence and still remain true to her femnist principles. It's not quite as bad as her "It's none of my business" excusing of Bill Clinton's and John Edwards' betrayal of their wives, but it comes close.

So, evidently, what all this femnist wedding angst (as opposed to angst about femnist weddings) boils down to is this:

When folks like you and I get married, when I wear a black tux and you a white dress, when we go for champagne and dinner and a band and giving the bride away and name changing and whatever, we're just mindless, unimaginative drones who are slaves to the whole patriarchy mandated male dominance and social conformity thingy.

Whereas...

If you're a femnist, and you get your dumb ass married in a white dress to some male femnist weenie in a black tux, and you throw a free feed with champagne and a band for friends and family to celebrate said heteronormative black tux 'n' white dress wedding, you're still a sensitive, principled femnist who is dedicated to overthrowing The Patriarchy. Especially if you keep your own name and ask everybody else to donate money in support of gay marriage.

Why?

Who the Hell knows. That's just the Way It Is.

Postscript: Any bets on who won't be doing the wedding cake for any of these bimbos? Guess who won't be picking the gowns and tuxedos? (Or helping with the spelling, for that matter...) I think I know who won't be supplying with marital bed for either of the lucky couples.

Friday's Music Picks From The World's Foremost (And Famous) Boogyin' Accountant...

First up, we have Plynth (Water Down The Drain) from the 1969 album Beck-Ola by The Jeff Beck Group. Consisting of Beck, Rod Stewart, Ronnie Wood, Nicky Hopkins and Tony Newman, the Jeff Beck Group ripped off this gloriously sloppy, paint-peeling album in four days. The mix is lousy, the songs uneven, and the performances punctuated by a certain number of missed notes (and beats), but it doesn't really matter... There's power here that most bands can't even imagine. One can only wonder what would have happened if Beck had managed to keep this lineup together... even if for just another year or so. One of the great "what if" groups of rock.

Several comments and emails indicated that last week's R.L. Burnside selection was appreciated. That's good, because I feel like putting up some more of his work. This is It's Bad You Know from the Come On In album. Of all the old blues masters that came to prominence in the 80s and 90s, it was Burnside that sounded the most contemporary. This song is an excellent example of that sound... Trance Blues.

An excellent measure of the relatvie worth of any record collection can be easily obtained by counting the number of Tom Waits albums within. The more Waits, the better the collection. Here we have Warm Beer And Cold Women, which comes from the superb Nighthawks At The Diner album. The back story on this album is a hoot: Waits couldn't convince his record company to record a live album, so he piled a bunch of his friends into the studio and proceeded to record one anyway! If you don't have any Waits in your collection, Nighthawks is the place to start. If you do have some Waits, but not this album, all I can say is, "What are you thinking?"

Finally, we've got Junior Kimbrough doing Sad Days, Lonely Nights from the album of the same name. Sad Days, Lonely Nights is, quite simply, a must-own album. Period.

Best Earth Day Ever...

Earth Day... April 22, 2009:

Earnest, smiling young female enviroweenie handing out pamphlets in front of library: Happy Earth Day!

Me... Before brain-to-mouth filter can engage: Blow it out your ass.

 

I must admit I should have felt some regret over being that rude, but I didn't. That makes this the best Earth Day I've ever been subjected to.

Time For The April 15th Boogie...

It's a little known fact that nearly all the great bluesmen started their careers as tax accountants.

No, really.

Anyway, let's boogie!

First let's start with Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown playing the "Okie Dokie Stomp"...

Then move on to Johnny Winter (the best goddamn blues guitar player ever) and Muddy Waters doing "Goin' Down Slow"...

Here's "Mississippi" Fred McDowell doing "Goin' Down To The River". One of the greats you've never ever heard of...

Next the Reverend K.M. Williams rips it up (on one string) with the "Oh Lordy Stomp"...

And close out with the one and only R.L. Burnside doing "Rollin' and Tumblin'"...

And if you haven't bought Volume 4 in the Johnny Winter Live Bootleg Series, you need to. Right now.

Timmy Spanks Dickie

Richard Murphy really is a knob. Now he's on about financing all his environmentally friendly euroweenie infrastructure projects via some silliness called "green bonds". As if England and the English don't have enough trouble as it is...

(Hey kids, here's Dennis' bit o' wisdom for the day: If you see the word "green" anywhere near a financial instrument, run from said instrument like your life depended on it.)

You'd think Dickie'd have enough sense to see the flaw in the plan, but then Richard wouldn't be Richard if he wasn't bedazzled by the pixie dust clogging up in between his own ears. Anyway, Tim Worstall does a nice job of pointing out the obvious.

 

 

Meanwhile, The Ninth Year of the Bush Administration Is Going Swimmingly...

Just for shits and giggles, let's see how the 9th year of George W. Obama's administration is doing...

Well, he's closed Guartanamo Bay, right?

And ended warrantless wiretaps, right?

And cut troop levels in Afghanistan, right?

And set a firm date for withdrawal from Iraq, right?

And cut funding for both wars, right?

And is punishing  those involved in "illegal" torture, right?

And getting the economy back on track using bold, imaginative thinking, right?

Ended the use of earmarks to fund projects and programs, right? 

Right.

So my question is this:

Where's the outrage we've come to expect from all our little Lefty friends?

Other questions present themselves as well:

Where are the street demonstrations?

And the giant paper-mache Obama heads?

And the impassioned denunciations from Hollywood stars?

And prominent Lefty bloggers?

Or the intelligensia?

Eh?

So to all my little Lefty friends I'll point out what should be The Obvious: Look in the fucking mirror.

You're the 2009 version of 2000-2008 Republicans.

For 8 years Republicans ignored, excused or rationalized away George W. Bush, Dick Armey, Bill First and Denny Hastert selling out every principle the Republican Party was supposed to stand for.

But that was then. Now Obama's selling out his base and they can't get enough of it... Just like the Republicans they despise. Progressives have got their lips locked on so fucking hard they can't see over the ass in from of them. And isn't that something that's new and different?

So, all my little Lefty readers, you can come here and bitch and moan and whine to your heart's content about I'm just too fucking stupid to understand the greatness of Dear Leader.

Just don't expect me to take you too seriously until I see you answering the questions above.

And if you do not, or cannot, answer those questions, then by my lights you're nothing more than kept men... Gigolos who've hooked up with some rich, fat old matron of a woman.

 

I Am Not A United Way Agency...

Since when was this blog supposed to be about me working diligently - without compensation - to ensure a pleasurable reading experience for you? Where did you get the idea I was some sort of United Way agency for blog readers? What gave you the idea that I had - or have - any sort of obligation to you?

Coming to DtP is entirely voluntary on everyone's part, including mine. And given the price I charge, I cannot understand what all the bitching is about. If I am no longer funny, find another site that is. If you don't like my political orientation, find another site more in tune with your beliefs. That's up to you...

What I cannot stress enough is this:

This is my blog.
It is about ME having fun.
It is about MY enjoyment.

Now here comes the important part, so pay attention:

You, on the other hand, are just along for the ride.
This blog is NOT about YOU having fun.
It is NOT about YOUR enjoyment.
Whether you stay or go doesn't matter.

If any of you want to plunk down cold hard cash for me to write, then I will take your editorial comments into consideration as I do so. Until that day comes (and it never will), I'll continue to do whatever I want. Sorry, but that's the way life works...

So, if I no longer amuse you, feel free to move on. If you cannot abide my political opinions, don't feel an obligation to experience further outrage. If you feel the need to let me know of your disappointment, understand that you only need to do so once before exiting.

There is no functioning Complaint Dept. at this site. Is that now clear?

Note: I'm in the middle of an IRS field audit and trying to get a mess of returns done by the 15th; at the moment I just don't have the time to babysit this site. Ergo, comments are closed on all posts until I have the time to monitor commenting. Between now and that happy time, I'd ask those of you with enough time on your hands to continue coming back here just to experience the unpleasantness of it all to consider finding a new hobby. I try to be patient with everyone, but there are limits... After all, I am an asshole, not a United Way agency.